Prisons of Our Own
by Golden Lion Tamarin
Summary: Amelie, by her own impulsive design, finds herself in the dungeon prison of the mind of the Phantom of the Opera. Stuck in a realm where night blends with day, fantasy: reality, pain: healing, the chords of a new opera ring across the underground lake. But will the last song be written before the Opera becomes a terrible reality? M just to be safe; no smut. COMPLETE
1. The Governess

**A/N: Hi! This is my first Phantom of the Opera fanfiction, and the first fanfiction in general that I am optimistic I may complete. I have a full outline and quite a few chapters finished, but I am in _desperate_ need of a Beta reader to help with things like characterization and plot (and spelling and grammar as well!)**

 **If you're interested, please let me know. And please leave reviews! Since I don't have a beta, I need all the help and insight I can get, and I'm eager to see what people think of this little venture.**

 **Thanks!**

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Chapter 1: The Governess

Madam Giry sought with excruciating pains the ideal candidate whom she could cast into certain woe. In the months after the horrible events of at the Opera House, fear lingered with baited breath in the stiflingly heavy smog of Paris, but for Madame Giry the dread was more poignant. Only she knew that the Phantom still resided in the house by the placid and unapologetic waters of the underground lake; only she knew that he teetered ever closer to arrant and unqualified madness; and only she knew the extent of the destruction he could leave in his wake, should he so choose.

This knowledge demanded preemptive and precautionary actions, but as Madame Giry stomped through the muddy streets, her boots squishing and heavy with every step, the nature of such action evaded her. As her first trick, Madame Giry attempted to lure the Phantom out of Paris altogether. She brought pictures of America's great inventions such as the light-bulb and the phonograph and told him of the Bowery and artist boroughs of New York City. When that failed to pique his interest, she tried to convince him to pursue more innovative operas, such as the Gesamtkunstwerk opera style, in which Wagner was rumored to be completing his final work, or architecture and ruins of the great civilizations of the Latin America; all to no avail. The Phantom insisted he could not leave Paris, especially not the Opera House. He refused to part with the last, lingering pieces of his life as the Opera Ghost and his muse...

When the Phantom would not leave, she tried to satiate his desperate need for human interaction and love by seeking him a concubine. Madame Giry had searched for sweaty, stained, harlots that lurked around corners desperate for a touch worth their trouble. Such a woman could, at the very least, provide a degree of physical comfort to the Ghost, and wasn't that enough to quell even a portion of the loneliness that maimed his soul? She believed that to be the source of his problems: he had never known love. And all humans needed love! The clerics in their austere robes and humbly solitary lives found comfort in the love of the Lord God and His Holy Trinity, the lepers and outcasts of society found solace in each other, and even the sickest and most diseased of the commonality were met with compassion and love on their deathbed. But the Phantom had no God, no equal among mortals, and only Madame Giry to comfort him in the event of his death, if Ghosts could even die. Yet, when she had brought lust to calm his nerves in the form of two women (though appalled and horrified at the lewd and ribald explanations, Madame Giry had heard that this would heighten a man's pleasure), she returned later only to find her failure enshrined in the lifeless companions' bodies on the banks of the lake, doomed to rot with their broken necks and bruised skins. The Ghost's touch was surely not worth their trouble.

When sexual stimulation could not satisfy him, Madame Giry briefly considered presenting him with another artist. The idea was short-lived, however, as it only took a moment of consideration to recall that it was art and obsession that had consumed and broken the Phantom's spirit in the first place. How could she possibly have even spared a thought to providing him with another protege? No, there would be no dancers, no singers, and no musicians. No mortal soul could match his passions, his talent, or _her_ voice.

Damn _her_ and good riddance! Madame Giry told herself. It seemed comfortable to blame poor, weeping Christine for the ruin in which the Phantom now lived, but Madame Giry knew it was all an attempt to circumvent her own, remarkable role in those events. For it was Madame Giry who had allowed Erik to cultivate his person as the _Angel of Music_ , not Christine; it was Madame Giry who had kept quiet his secret passages and his underground abode; and it was Madame Giry who dutifully carried out her role as a pawn in his game. Her lack of fortitude had allowed him to plant the seeds of tenderness and trust, or more adequately of obsession and deceit. She nurtured the Phantom's obsession, and the guilt choked in her lungs like the smog and fog of the Parisian streets.

If the Opera Ghost could not manage romance, maybe he could manage fostering a boy as damned and unlovable as he? Madame Giry only considered this for a second; of course an orphan could not pluck the heartstrings of the Phantom, for it was the chains and wounds of his own childhood that still haunted him. In so many ways, the Ghost was just a child himself. A child that she had left to die in black and tragedy.

But all children need pets! Madame Giry thought to herself. And so she had brought him a songbird, gray with a black cap, and a sweet voice that could mimic any melody with enough repetition.

"It will learn very quickly," She explained to the Phantom. "You could teach it to sing."

"Is this your idea of a divine comedy? A cruel humor?" He snarled from behind his mask. "Do not tell me you are so ignorant, so acutely stupid, as to think that a _bird_ could sing my music, as if a _bird_ could somehow replace Christine!"With that he had snatched the cage from her trembling hands, throwing it through the cavern with an agility both magnificent and terrifying. The cage clamored against the cold, damp stone, bending its bars and allowing the bird to escape while screeching a cacophony of fear and freedom into the darkness.

"And now look what you've done," His voice was softer now but had lost none of it's malice. "Surely it will die down here, like me. And like you, should these pathetic attempts continue."

No, Madame Giry realized, a pet would not do. A whore would not do. A child would not do. His soul anguished in perpetual torment and without Christine, he had disintegrated into something less than human. He was just a mass, hollow without purpose or passion, shattered and left in the dungeons to ferment in the last of five decades' worth of heartbreak that had finally ruined him. He needed someone to care for him, someone to keep him from wasting away.

Madame Giry was not up to the task herself. No, she had too much to live for. She had a pretty, unemployed, unmarried daughter and the absence of a husband or father meant that their situation was precarious at best. She could not afford to sacrifice anymore for the ungrateful Ghost, and that was without considering the fear of him. Though she had cared for him, always from a safe distance, she had never learned to live with the terror caused by the Phantom's unpredictable nature and could not resign her or Meg to a life in caverns and dread. Poor, poor Erik! Even those closest to him could only cringe at the thought of helping him through these most desperate of times.

Futile though it seemed, Madame Giry felt compelled by this sentiment to seek for the Phantom a companion, a caretaker, or a friend. The Persian had ran from the debacle, assuming Erik dead or at the very least tamed and broken for the rest of his days. So she sought anyone who could spend the days with him, perhaps removing the stink of cognac and wine from his breath and replacing them with cards or, dare she even hope?, returning them to his violin.

With a deafening thud, the answer hit her. A moment of black in her vision, and the shocking pressure of body against her face, and she had found her solution (though it was yet still unbeknownst to her).

"Madame, my sincerest apologies," A soft, articulate voice said, barely louder than whisper. "I had rushed out the gate without turning to look, I did not mean to disturb you."

"Oh you little, fool," Madame Giry mumbled as she smoothed her frock as best as possible, looking up to face the perpetrator of this assault. As her eyes found the girl, she paused her intended scoldings. "We've met before, have we not? You're the new governess to the Michaud family?"

"We have and I was. I have recently been… shall we say, released from my responsibilities," The girl smiled softly.

"Why?"

"Suffice it to say, Madame…"

"Giry."

"Well, suffice to say, Madame Giry, the Madame Michaud felt that I am an infernal bore, my connected letters are sloppy like a child's, and my abysmal humor was unbecoming of her rank and status." Her hazel eyes, and the slightest creases at their corner, betrayed no shame. In fact, Madame Giry could see quite plainly that the girl seemed rather amused.

"And mademoiselle, to who's employment will you now find yourself?"

"I find myself in no employ, for now," she said, her voice careful but without worry.

"And your family, Mademoiselle?"

"Please, you may call me Amelie, or Mademoiselle Comtois if you find that more to your liking. But, alas, I have no family in Paris and no family I should like to associate with beyond that."

"Unemployed, with no family… but perhaps you are to wed soon?"

"It was avoidance of a wedding that brought me to Paris in the first place, Madame. Suffice it to say, the endeavor is of no concern to me now and will not be until a time of my own choosing. So often it is us women who must suffer the fate of an improper match at the commands and whims of men. The rank of governess had previous afforded me enough solitude that I could avoid such caper. But with your analysis, my situation does seem rather hazardous… Perhaps I'm destined to be a tavern wench," Amelie, bared her teeth in a hearty laugh. Madame Giry found herself smiling as well. Amelie's mannerisms demonstrated a flippant neglect for decorum, but Madame Giry could easily deduce that she seemed unnerved at the prospect of living and working on the streets.

"Or perhaps, you would like to remain a governess?" Madame Giry offered.

"Madame, though unrefined I may seem, I am still a woman of dignity and I would prefer to keep that in tact," Amelie replied, the smile falling from her lips. "Have you knowledge of any positions? Or perhaps children of your own?"

"Indeed, I have one, a rather troublesome one at that."


	2. The Drunk

**A/N: Thank you to those of you who have reviewed! I didn't want to post this chapter quite yet, but I think this one should be good, too. If you're interested in helping me proofread or fact-check or deal with pacing and characters, I would love any help and insight!**

 **Please review and thank you for reading!**

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Chapter 2: The Drunk

The soft, sweet sound echoed through the caverns again, causing Erik to force his hands against his ears in a desperate attempt to drown out the song. Ever since Madame Giry had brought that infernal creature to his mournful abode, the songbird frantically roamed the tunnels searching for its escape and crying the entire way. Its song was forlorn and desperate, a feeling all too familiar to Erik. It seemed suiting that the poor bird should take up his chorus as he could not bring himself to even consider creating it himself. Not since Christine.

But blast! The delicate nature of the bird's cries reminded him so much of her. Her smooth, lush voice with it's angelic range, the soft breaths between phrases, the growing conviction in her words as he coaxed her towards confidence… the affection with which she sang to the Vicomte, the blush in her cheeks when her lips met his, the tears in her eyes when she made her final choice, the torment of her returning, only for a moment, to hear him proclaim his love before leaving him again! The memories were agonizing! And as long as that bird's song haunted his walls, he could not escape them.

"SILENCE!" He bellowed into the darkness. The sounds stopped. Basking in this slightest of reprieves, Erik raised his heavy, broken body, walking a few feet away to the floor where he had left his cognac in a drunken stupor the night before. Night before? Day before? The hours blurred together and though he had once been acutely aware of time, allowing him to properly manage the affairs of his opera house, currently he had no grasp of it. It was a useless concept to him now. Time only matters to those with obligations; it is a worthwhile construct for those who grow distressed at the thought of it slipping between their fingers like water. Erik, on the other hand, had too much time. He was drowning in it, only it seemed he could not die. Not yet. The cruel oceans of the world had not spent him completely.

"Monsieur? Hello, who is that voice in the darkness?"

"No more of this, Madame Giry. Leave me be, you horrid harpy!" Erik shouted, stepping outside his house by the lake to ensure his demand be heard.

"Pardon, monsieur, I am not Madame Giry," The voice called to him. "I did not mean to intrude, it is not my intention. But as it is, I am trapped down here with no way out."

"Well, how did you get in?" He snarled, tired of the game already. The voice belonged to a girl. _Dear god, please not another prostitute_. Erik despised the practice and Madame Giry's experiment had been, to put it mildly, an utter disaster.

"Madame Giry blindfolded me and left me here. I was quite sure I was alone until I heard you call out to the songbird."

"Oh for heaven's sake," Erik rubbed his unblemished temple with a gloved hand in exhaustion. Another attempt to provide him with solace? Another waste. And how did she manage to get an entire person down here without him noticing? Perhaps it was time to retreat from his consistent drunkenness, at least until these intrusions subsided. "Then she has condemned you to die down here unless you can free yourself. You are no responsibility of mine."

Silence lingered, deafeningly, in the darkness of the caverns until interrupted by a mighty splash. Erik raised his head to look across the lake but he could make out no figures in the depths. Where he expected to see a head or a limb bobbing across the surface there were only ripples across the water. A few bubbles. A return to silence.

"Good, let it drown," he muttered to himself. He brought the cognac to his lips and took in a mouthful, savoring the burning sensation under the sides of his tongue and down his throat. Then, to his surprise, another splash from the lake drew his attention. A woman broke the surface, looking like a pathetic, wet sewer rat, with a gasp and a cry.

"Oh blast it's cold, I've never felt so cold, how is it so cold?" The girl continued splashing (Erik could hardly call it "swimming") and flailing across the surface until she had finally pulled herself high enough to allow her body to crumble. Water lapped up against her face as she lay on the frigid stone. She panted heavily at her exertion, the only sound heard in the cavern.

"You would let me drown?" She cried in dismay, rolling herself onto her back, still partially submerged.

"I would rather you have drowned, yes, it would spare me the effort of killing you myself," Erik replied. He had already set the cognac bottle down, taking up his lasso in exchange, and trudging heavily down towards the lake. She did not scurry away, nor did she scream, as he approached.

"Well I apologize then, monsieur," the heavy breathing continued. "For I can assure you, I am usually much more agreeable than this when regarding my employers. Certainly, never has one threatened to kill me!"

"Do not be facetious with me," He growled. "And who, pray tell, is your employer?"

"Monsieur, that would be you, by way of the Madame Giry," The girl sat up with a straight back, a feeble attempt at composure, Erik garnered. Despite his threats, she remained stoic, clinically so, as if she were completely detached from her current situation. Her demeanor was that of the ideal governess and conveyed her quiet, somber, yet authoritative, disposition.

"And what _services_ do you offer?"

"Monsieur, I am a governess. I am here to assist with tending the child. Madame Giry mentioned a young boy with a hot temper."

Erik's blood burned as he realized Madame Giry's cruel joke; that _he_ was the child. What a horrid woman she could be.

"And what have you to offer?"

"I confess, monsieur, I am neither extraordinary nor exceptional in any one study but I can read, write, and teach simple maths and histories. Additionally, I can speak English, French, German, and Italian. And," She hesitated, peering into the surrounding abyss before continuing carefully, "though not typical, I am more than capable of cooking and keeping house, as it appears you have no further staff."

"My dear mademoiselle," Erik sneered. "Have you not realized this is not your typical city home or chateau? Have you not used your incredibly keen skills of observation to note that we currently find ourselves in underground tunnels and sewers? Of course there is no staff."

"Yes, monsieur, of course. Pardon."

"As it is, I find myself in no need of your services." He tightened his grip on the lasso.

"Of course monsieur, then I should like to take my leave... at no further cost to either of us, of course." The girl (woman? She was older than Christine, but not by many years) spoke with a hollow courage; something that belonged to a well-trained creature that had learned its behavior would always lead to the same outcome. Erik noticed her garments were damp and clinging to her body in a most unceremonious fashion. The hand that did not hold the lasso came up quickly to cover his eyes as Erik's inclination towards murder gave way to shame.

"'Of course' nothing, you cannot leave!" His words were frantic and exasperated as his gloved hand shielded her from his curiosity. "Surely Madame Giry told you this. Or were you so desperate that you asked no questions and begged no explanation?"

"Those of us without great family and title must always seek any opportunity to be of service," She replied, her eyes pointed down in subservience. He heard her teeth clatter together in a moment of weakness.

"Of course we must," still grasping the lasso, Erik huffed in defeat, knowing that he could not condemn this woman. He had killed too often and had grown tired. He did not want to kill now. "There is no child here, and I have no use of your services. But alas you must know where you are and to whom you speak… how many other pitiful horrors live beneath the streets in stifling gloom, besides the Phantom of the Opera?... You must realize by now that you cannot be free."

"Of course, monsieur, as you wish," The subservient gaze remained fixed.

"Enough of this. Dress yourself, this room will have garments for you," Erik said, his voice betraying more of his fatigue than he would have preferred.

After a releasing a heavy sigh previously held hostage in her lungs, the girl followed his pointing hand. Erik led her towards a door with a dust covered handle, a door he had not touched since…

"You will find all you need in there." His hand recoiled before touching the door as if burned by the memories. The girl, oblivious to his hesitation, authoritatively grasped the handle in her own, smaller, calloused hand and it opened with little resistance.

"Thank you, monsieur," She bowed her head in a meager curtsy again before entering the room. After the door shut quietly, he listened as she stumbled in the dark. It amused him to hear the series of _thunks,_ _clunks_ , and stomps, and the still-intact side of his mouth curled so slightly into a wry smile, until he heard a _bang_ , _clatter_ , and _thud_ followed by the intruder's curses.

"Oh blast, dammit!"

Before he could stop himself, Erik had opened the door.

"Trying to kill yourself already, or are you simply that dense?" Perhaps his contempt would hide the flash of uncharacteristic worry. How unbecoming of the Opera Ghost to muddle his mind so with the details of lowly mortals. The irony crept into his thoughts often; ever since Christine left the Opera House, he had for all intents and purposes relinquished his position as the tortuous Opera Ghost, yet he felt more phantom than ever before.

"Pardon, monsieur, but there is no light," She replied in earnest from her heap on the floor. "An oil lamp or even a candle would be most thoroughly appreciated."

Without a word, Erik retrieved a lamp and lit it, returning to find her still curled up on the same spot.

"Oh thank you, monsieur, you're very kind," Her smile seemed genuine as her small fingers stretched out to the lamp.

"What pleasant lies you must tell yourself," Erik huffed as he shut and locked the door behind him.


	3. The Introduction

**A/N: Thank you so much for reading! Please, please, please for the love of all that is good, please review! I am desperate for feedback, even flames!, anything to keep me on the right track.**

 **As a warning: This story is a tragedy. Just a heads up. Y'all are safe for quite a few chapters, but just be warned it's listed as Tragedy for a reason.**

 **Special thanks to** **Kaylyn Palmeter for looking over this chapter!**

 **Happy reading and again... reviews! messages! anything!**

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The dark, dust covered room was not intended for guests and the air hung heavy with the fetid, stale air of a tomb. Small combs were strewn on the top of a vanity, surrounded by dust, next to a perfume bottle smelling of light, spring flowers (perhaps gardenia? Amelie could not tell). An untouched rouge and a dried rose with a bent stem only added to the feeling that Amelie found herself trapped in a tableau not intended for her.

 _So the rumors are true._

She pulled open the chest of drawers and began the task of changing her soaked layers for those belonging to the goddess to whom the entire room paid homage. Of course, the garments didn't fit as well. She was slightly too large, both in height and fullness, and Amelie found she could not lace the pieces completely without her skin pouring over seams in a most obscene fashion.

The impulsiveness of her choice to enter the Phantom's abode crept into her conscience and suddenly Amelie felt profoundly unprepared. Madame Michaud had cast her out so abruptly and while she attributed her actions to Amelie's sarcastic humor and "ill-decorum", Amelie knew the true reason to be her lecherous husband's wandering eyes. But no trouble; it was not the first or the last time a governess would be cast out for fear of a husband's seduction. In fact, a governess position almost always revolved around the nature of the man of the house. Should he prove himself cruel to the children? Undoubtedly, the governess was responsible for their poor behavior that triggered a father's retribution. Does the master no longer visit his lady's chambers? Well it must be the philandering governess's siren powers overwhelming him. Have money troubles fallen upon the family? Look towards the governess, for she always sticks her greedy hands in pockets not her own.

Though exhausting in its endless parade of gossip and scandals, Amelie found the working life exceedingly more pleasant than the alternative. After her father passed away, her uncle in the country had thought it advantageous to marry her. The match was not entirely terrible in that the family, and the groom, were respectable, kind, and humble people. But the fact that Amelie herself had no say in the match, let alone the decision to marry at all, made the entire affair abhorrent and abominable. These events, an undesired proposal and an untimely termination of employment, had transpired only within the previous fortnight. Amelie's first instinct had been to leave France altogether but the Fates intervened by ensuring that her application to governess abroad was denied and that she would literally run into Madame Giry.

What a rash decision she had made! Of course, Madame Giry had tried only feebly to persuade Amelie of the indecency of the position provided. She had made some allusion to the fact that the position was permanent and arduous ("permanently arduous!"), but when Amelie had impetuously agreed, Madame Giry made no attempt to elaborate further upon the circumstances. And, of course, Amelie had not asked. Whatever situation she now found herself in necessarily benefited her in that she was not on the street doused in rouge haggling over the price of her body.

So, with that consideration, she pushed through her mind's scoldings and finally managed to squirm into a simple frock she thought suitable for an evening introduction. Amelie moved towards the door but stopped momentarily in order to don a long, white wool robe over her shoulders. The cold would certainly take some getting used to. Reaching out to the door with the slightest pressure she felt the gentle resistance and heard the click of the lock. Shocked, she tried it again to no avail.

Amelie's instinct told her to cry out to the home's master. Perhaps there had been a mistake? How extraordinarily odd it would be for the master of the house to lock a governess's door! But this was no typical home and her employer no typical master. She knew it from the moment he growled, " _You must know where you are and to whom you speak_ "; the barbs on his every word made it undeniable. She knew the stories of the Phantom of the Opera and the prima donna he held hostage and tormented, until her lover valiantly charged into the shadows and rescued her. There would be no need for such dramatics this time, Amelie knew. She had more courage and resilience and would not need rescuing. The Phantom could not torment her because she felt so innately in control of her own soul.

For the moment, though, Amelie abandonedly sighed and sat on the white silk covers of the bed. No strength of character would provide her small stature with the strength to knock down doors and so she resigned herself to patient, thoughtful apprehension. Things could be worse. If she weren't here in this exact spot, things would be worse. Amelie repeated the words in her mind.

In her view, there was no room for compromise; to live with a broken spirit was to resign oneself to a hollow, wretched existence, and she could not betray herself in such a way. When Amelie told Madame Giry that she valued her womanly virtue and dignity, she had not lied. To sacrifice that for money, to feel the touch of a new monster night after night for the rest of her days, meant damnation in this life and the next. To spend her life in the service of a madman was not a sin. Amelie smiled to herself as she told herself it would not be so different from living under Madame Michaud. She could at least revel in scoldings in a lower octave that would not assault her ears and threaten her with insanity.

"Girl, come here," A gruff voice called to her as the lock clicked. Amelie prepared herself, letting out a heavy exhale and inhaling the air of servitude she knew would adequately placate the Phantom. Though she tended to be foolish and impulsive Amelie was not unintelligent, and so the precariousness of her situation did not go unnoticed. These early days and weeks would determine her survival.

She entered the dully lit, frigid sitting room where the Phantom sat in an arm chair, poised as if he had not been at her door only moments ago. Light from the small fireplace danced across the shining white of the mask that covered half his face. But the Ghost's eyes burned like the fires of hell and his gaze felt like a searing wound across Amelie's flesh. Though well-dressed in a coat and slacks, she could still make out his unnaturally long limbs. And his hands! Long, bony, and oddly… elegant. The man that stood before her seemed not of this world; whether that was to her benefit or had yet to be determined. She clenched her jaw together in determination. He did not have the heads or the claws of Scylla, the snakes of Medusa, or the face of a Minotaur. Before her was a man. A man with a mask. Nothing more.

"Good monsieur, I thank you for the accommodations," Amelie said softly, her hands clasped together and her gaze adamantly pointed downwards.

"They were not meant for you," the Phantom said sternly. The sweet silky, sound of his voice filled her simultaneously with wonder and dread. It was a lush, wonderful lullaby, but overwhelmingly dark and threatening. The words seeped into her skin and made their home among bones and blood and flesh and Amelie felt unnerved by the sudden and new influence. "And as it were, those garments clearly do not fit."

"I have a few items of my own, across the lake," She glanced up quickly to the burning eyes. Those eyes burned like fire! It was as if something about the Phantom's being was not content to simply exist; it hungered and craved and _needed_ desperately by its very nature to consume and control everything around it. _He is just a man_ , Amelie declared to herself again, this time more forcefully. For this time, she did not feel quite as confident in her own assertion."As you have probably noticed, I am not the strongest swimmer."

"Quite an understatement," he scoffed. "What is your name?"

"Amelie Comtois, monsieur."

"Your family is from the country? _Franche-Comte_?"

"Yes, monsieur."

"And tell me, Amelie, what is your tale of woe? What dismal story condemns you to this fate? Surely Madame Giry would not have selected you unless you were completely absent of fortune, prospects, or other such redeeming qualities."

Amelie felt her jaw instinctively clench and grind her teeth together as he taunted her and his beautiful song-voice threatened her sanity. _He is only a man._

"I have no tale of woe," Amelie replied. "I was raised in the west country, by a French father and a German mother-"

"A forbidden love, how tragically sentimental."

"I grew up in a comfortable home. When my mother died, my father and I came to Paris. It seemed everyone wanted to move to the city. He taught me reading, arithmetic, and history. I learned Italian and English by my own volition. These lessons provided me ample opportunity as a governess and when he passed away recently, I began seeking work as such… it wasn't the stunning success as I anticipated, yet I feel no remorse. As I said, no tale of woe, monsieur."

"No tale of woe, _yet_ ," He corrected, a fiendish smirk showing in the shadows. The Phantom stood and circled her silently as a cat circles its prey. His steps were silent and elegant, and his eyes would glow from deep in his skull, only furthering the resemblance, and Amelie for a brief moment felt all hope flee from her soul. But with a sharp inhale, Amelie could smell the liquor wafting from his breath, though he held no bottle. He must be a man! What ghost need revel in drunkenness? The victory was brief, but invaluably reassuring. Amelie's skin shivered with goosebumps and her hair stood on end as he moved close enough for her to feel the heat of his exhales. "Let me be perfectly clear. Your presence is a signal of futile desperation. Madame Giry perhaps thought you could help me, but in bringing you here has shown nothing but utter disregard and stupidity. Such a heartless endeavor; I assure you the loudest piece of her conscience has told her you are already dead. Did she tell you what happened to the last women she left here? Regardless, she will not come back to ascertain whether you met the same fate or not."

He stopped in front of her now, _those eyes!_ , and Amelie dug her nails into her palms. _Just a man, he is just a man. A drunk man, a horrid man, but a man nonetheless._

"If we are speaking candidly, and I believe we can, can't we?" The Phantom quipped in violently dulcet tones. "I do not know why you are still alive. Perhaps it is pity that stayed my hand or maybe curiosity. Perhaps it is loneliness… after all, I am _only a man_ …"

Her nails dug deeper into her palms and the acute feeling of skin ripping shook her. Could he read her mind?

"Please, monsieur," Amelie kept her gaze downward and found comfort that her eyes could not portray her fear. "You asked earlier of my services, and I would like to be perfectly clear that I will _not_ be able to provide you with anything beyond that. I may be, as you said, absent of prospects or quality, but I am a virtuous woman. I ask that my honor be respected."

" _Respected_?" the Phantom spat. "You crawl into the gutter, you ask to dine with the rats, and then you demand decorum?"

"Monsieur, I am not a servant. I will not be treated as such."

"You will be treated as I please," he snapped. In the swiftest of movements, he placed a gloved hand around her throat. "You've a pretty neck; long, slim, like Bastet herself… it would be a shame if you were to force me to break it."

Visceral fear pounded through her veins, loud in her ears and hot through her muscles. The Phantom's touch, even through his gloves, was frigid cold, the cold of death that devours all warmth around it; the cold of stone, as if he were just another piece of the fifth cellar of the Opera House, built of misshapen granite; an inexplicable cold that can only be described as the absence of everything all at once, no life, no light, no warmth, just a frigid, endless void. Amelie gasped for air the same way she gasped through the frigid waters of the lake, desperate and dying. In this last attempt at life, Amelie realized that his grip upon her was menacing, but loose. He had not committed to strangle her yet and she could still fight him. The voice, the eyes, the cold had not consumed her yet.

"Monsieur, if you will take my honor then I ask you take my life as well."

"And so you believe all the stories of the Opera Ghost, then? You believe me a monster capable of such a depredation?"

"This is not a matter of gossip or belief," Amelie replied. The Phantom was testing her the way a small child would, albeit with horribly more grim consequences. Though his behavior seemed both comic and terrible in that sense, standards needed to be set and so she mimicked his tone as she said, "I only thought we should continue to speak _candidly_."

The Phantom released his grip and turned from her and her hands immediately flew to her neck, caressing and rubbing the previously assaulted flesh.

"I do not take meals and I do not require a tutor, as if any homosapien could teach me at all... You may tidy as you see fit, but do not move a single thing. It is my home and everything is in its place."

Amelie eyed overturned glasses and bottles around the arm chair ruefully.

"You will find little amusement here. There are books. I hope you enjoy them. There are only two rules… rather, _demands_ … to which you must abide. First, do not ever enter my own room under any circumstances. Second, you may never leave."

He turned to face her and Amelie nodded obediently. She would agree to anything the beautiful voice demanded in order to keep the eyes and the cold of his hands away from her.

"That last one shouldn't be a problem, as you have nowhere to go, I suppose." His voice carried pride in it's cruel reminder.

"Of course, monsieur," she replied softly with her most saccharine smile. "One last thing, monsieur, a question, if I may?"

He nodded obligingly.

"What may I call you?"

"Monsieur will suffice."


	4. The First Conversation

**A/N: Hey you, I see you reading! Please sign the guestbook on your way out and leave me a review. Feedback is essential and I would love to hear your thoughts. Where would you like to see this go? What are your expectations? How do you feel about the characters thus far? Is Erik in character?**

 **I wanna know everything!**

 **Happy reading (:**

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Chapter 4: The First Conversation

Marta Bauer first met Julien Comtois in the Alsace-Lorraine region of France or Germany, depending on the year, before returning to Monsieur Comtois's hometown of Soucia. The marriage left Marta isolated from her family, who refused to accept the abhorrence of a Prussian daughter marrying a Frenchman, but the small town of Soucia, two days' travel from Alsace-Lorraine, paid no mind to the unthinkable union. And so, it was there, le _Région des Lacs,_ that Monsieur and Madame Comtois bore and raised a strong, vivacious baby whom they called Amelie. Nearly the first decade of her life was spent under Marta's watchful eye, reading books by _le petit lac de Clairvaux_ and swimming in its cool, crisp waters.

The days by the lake in the tall grasses covered by scarcely clouded skies seemed long and endless. Marta, to Julien's amusement, insisted Amelie learn the lives and works of all the Bronte sisters; a daughter who could emulate the indomitable spirit of Helen Graham in _The Tenant of Wildfell Hall_ or the enduring composure of Jane Eyre would survive in the new world Marta insisted grew before their very eyes.

"You'll see, _meine kleine liebe_ , a woman's place in the world is changing! You'll be a great woman subject to no desires but your own," Marta used to say to Amelie before cupping the child's small, rosy cheeks in her hands and planting a gentle kiss on her forehead.

Amelie remembered with the utmost affection the picnics of Comte cheese, cherry jam, and morteau by the lake. Another boy from the village, Theo Moreau, and his mother, Antoinette Moreau, would join them on some occasions. Antoinette would complain of the libertine nature of her husband, who often found himself traveling to the ports in Marseille, which would lead Marta to lecture both her (and any other ears that could be bent in her direction) on the importance of a woman who would not indulge the loose morals of a man.

"And should you choose to pursue such endeavors, _meine liebste_ Antoinette, what then?"

"Do not even mention such an atrocious thing, Marta!" Antoinette would scold humorously. "Well, you should find me dead the next day, and little Theo without a mother."

Amelie and Theo, who would venture down near the banks of the lake, though never swim together for she was a proper lady and he a gentleman, would listen with inquisitive minds to these conversations.

"And are _you_ a libertine?" Amelie had asked of him one day, as she sat by the lake. Theo came to her side to present her with a bouquet of small lavender and yellow flowers. Amelie squealed with delight, "Oh! The purples are my favorite!"

"Never, mademoiselle!" Theo exclaimed. "For you see, one day you and I shall be married and I will come to you every morning with the loveliest purple flowers. We'll sit by the lake and picnic just as we do now."

"But only if _I want to_ ," Amelie corrected sternly. "I am my own soul's keeper!"

"Of course you will want to," Theo replied coolly. "And we will be as good of friends as ever, as we are now!" He leaned towards her tiny frame to plant a gentle kiss on her cheek.

"No, Theo! _Mutter_ , he's tried to kiss me!" Amelie cried indignantly.

"And what do you say?" Marta asked. Amelie tried to think and remember what it was that she was taught to say…

"I… I…. I! I need not sell my soul to buy bliss!" Amelie rejoiced at remembering the words of Anne Bronte, but Theo seemed unimpressed. In truth, they seemed incredibly mismatched to the situation. But Marta adored the words from Charlotte Bronte, ("I can live alone, if self-respect, and circumstances require me so to do. I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. I have an inward treasure born with me, which can keep me alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld, or offered only at a price I cannot afford to give.") and if she could impart this kind of fortitude upon her own daughter in a time when women had no status and no prospects, save those relinquished to them by men, then she could count herself a success in motherhood.

"And a kiss is your soul? That's silly, Amelie." Theo scrunched the young, soft skin of his nose up in disdain and incredulous confusion.

"It is my soul because it is mine to give and mine alone. No one can take a kiss from me!"

"I'll have one from you someday, you'll see!" Theo replied as he began splashing water on her from the lake.

It was one of the last sunny, cloudless days they would spend in the vast, yellow-flowered fields. Marta grew ill and, within weeks, Amelie and Julien would bury her. The inability to remember the beautiful, warm days in Soucia near the mountains without falling to thoughts of her mother's death tormented Amelie. Yet it was her mother's words that strengthened Amelie and gave her the grit and gallantry to always pursue her own desires above all else. It was her mother's words that allowed her to refuse her arranged marriage, her mother's words that gave her courage when Madame Michaud cast her out, and her mother's words that rang in her mind now, as she stood, hands on hips, observing her environment in Monsieur's underground abode.

It was a daunting task; where would she begin? Monsieur grew agitated when Amelie approached any of the stacks of musical scores littered throughout his home. He scowled when she approached the layers of dust with a torn linen. The flame used to heat water caused him to squint and glare in her direction and the delicate scent of brewing tea unvaryingly led him to storm off. Despite this, and partially at the behest of her more wicked side, Amelie carefully organized the operas alphabetically by composer, fought valiantly against the layers of grime when Monsieur found himself engrossed in his odd tinkering, and left a hot cup of tea outside his chamber every evening.

Monsieur's disagreeable disposition, however, was a reprieve from the outside world. In his company, or rather in his sanctuary under the opera house, the pressure and urgency of her unsolicited proposal finally felt extraneous and inconsequential. In the underground labyrinth of tunnels Monsieur called home, Amelie fluttered about from one task to the next and reveled in her freedom to spend her days as she wanted without the worries or burdens brought about by husbands and family. In addition, she felt no anxiety that Monsieur would threaten her honor or decency, the one defining feature of her womanhood. In fact, he had only requested, rather "demanded", two things of her; that Amelie never leave and that she respect his privacy. The irony of Monsieur's request, as if escape were the one thing she desired most, lay in the fact that Amelie had never found herself more at peace. Of course the absence of sunlight made waking after sleep confusing and Amelie noticed her body felt groggy and fatigued more often than awake and vivacious, as was her typical nature, but this made it easier for her to maintain the quiet and deferential air Monsieur undoubtedly required.

But the days passed in agonizing indifference between her and Monsieur and no words had exchanged since their initial conversation. On her part, Amelie did not speak for fear of antagonizing the Phantom. It seemed judicious to avoid all interaction as it was the only way to ensure her well-being. She had heard the rumors of the killer Phantom and the haunting, tormenting Opera Ghost, and based on his behavior earlier, Amelie inferred that she had only barely evaded his attack and her likely death. But at least some part of her believed he was, truly, only a man. Perhaps a monstrous one, a violent one, and behind the mask, a disfigured one, but still just a man. Amelie believed that made him, on some level, subject to the same basic desires as any person, and in that sense Monsieur was predictable; but the assumption was not enough to warrant any sort of social maneuvering on her part.

The only sound to break the silence was that of the lost songbird's cries. Some days Amelie heard them only faintly in the distance. Other days they seemed close enough that she strained her eyes to gaze into the shadows to find the poor creature.

"At least I have some company," She whispered to herself as she tore small pieces of stale bread to leave out for the bird. Though she never saw the creature, the bread crumbs would always disappear after a short time and so she continued day after to day to leave the small morsels for her friend. "I'll call you Feste after the song-fool in _Twelfth Night_. You sing sweet songs but by the time I can listen you're already gone. I wonder where you go? What other secrets do the tunnels and passages here hold?"

Amelie hesitated for a moment as if waiting for a response to her soft words spoken to the shadows. None came.

She had started reading through Shakespeare's Comedies again. Growing up she had always preferred the comedies over the tragedies or the histories and now, in permanent darkness, it warmed her to read the puns of _Love's Labour's Lost_ , the rational magic of _The Tempest_ , and the delicious ironies of _Twelfth Night_. In fact, it was the last of these plays that served as her first catalyst for her first amicable, by all relative measures, conversation with Monsieur.

" _Twelfth Night_?" he asked with his own eyebrow raised skeptically. The dulcet tones of his voice threatened to consume her. How was it possible for a mortal man to speak with such divine beauty? "It's hardly his strongest work. Nothing more than a stylized knock off."

"Pardon, Monsieur?"

"Not that I would expect you to know such a thing," Monsieur continued haughtily as he imbibed a vintage wine directly from the bottle with no hesitation. "But the entire work is based on a Renaissance play from Italy. It was _Commedia dell'Arte._ "

"Yes, Monsieur... the original work was _Gl'ingannati,_ if I am not mistaken?" She offered softly. Perhaps he would appreciate her knowledge on the subject. After all, she had taught herself Italian largely through the works of the Italian renaissance theater and counted the stock characters as intimate friends of her own. Then again, Amelie feared Monsieur would view her conversational offering as a challenge and show his characteristic anger. As she had so many times recently, she ground her jaw and curled her hands into tiny fists.

"Hmm… that's correct," Relief washed over her. Monsieur did not seem entirely dismayed. "Perhaps you were not as abysmal a governess as I had assumed."

"Pardon?"

"Well if you had been even a halfway decent role model, caregiver, and tutor, or even an artist, you would not have ended up here."

"I suppose we have that in common," Amelie retorted before she could stop herself. As soon as she realized what had been said, she shut her eyes tight in a grimace. Curse her untimely humor!

But the swift and vengeful scolding she expected did not come.

"Perhaps, mademoiselle."

A silence fell between them. Sometimes, the silences comforted Amelie. The absence of words was better than threats and curses. But the crippling darkness and all-devouring quiet made the lack of auditory stimulation painful at times.

"Pardon, Monsieur," Amelie asked softly, emboldened by their previous exchange. "Does the silence not haunt you? Sometimes I find my mind wandering and creating sounds that feel just off in the distance, as if I could turn the corner and hear them with complete clarity. But I can never find them."

"Ah, that would be the madness setting in," He smiled and it sent a chill through Amelie's blood. "The music from the Opera House used to permeate these walls. It would help."

"The rumors said that the Phantom made his own music. They spoke of haunting melodies that would wake people in the night."

"Once upon a time, perhaps the Phantom did such a thing," Monsieur's voice sounded heavy and pitiful, beautifully tragic. "But now, there is no muse and no music."

Amelie dare not venture to push the topic further. This had been such astounding progress between them and she felt the muscles in her shoulders slump down in relaxation. In her eagerness to qualify and justify her position by thinking her solitude as a reprieve, she had not noticed until now how much she craved human interaction. After a moment, Amelie ventured more conversation in the form of cordial small-talk.

"Has my work been to your liking, Monsieur?"

"You have not been as disruptive as I first expected," From across the room, he had not raised his eyes from his work. It appeared he was drawing, but what? Perhaps a still-life. It was really the only form of life here; everything felt paralyzingly permanent.

Another halt in their conversation, but this time Monsieur did not provide an opportunity for Amelie to seek further interaction. He took his sketch parchment and wine and retired with silent steps to his chambers.

In the distance, Amelie could hear Feste sound with hesitant song. She stood, went to the small kitchen, and tore small pieces of stale bread. She placed the plate outside the house on the lake, on a small ledge and hesitated for a few minutes to see if the songbird would grace her with his presence.

"Oh, Feste… you are a fickle friend indeed."


	5. Eleonora

**A/N:** **Thanks to everyone reading! So far this story has the most visitors and views out of any story I've written (and I've posted and deleted more than the two that are currently on FFN). Big thanks to everyone sticking with us through this one!**

 **That being said, there's a heck a lot of you that I would love to hear from. Send me messages/reviews/whatever! I've tried to reference outside sources to keep the story grounded in the time period; how's it working out? Let me know!**

 **Here we get a little more background into Amelie, so I hope you are all excited to get to know her more!**

 **Happy reading!**

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Chapter 5: Eleonora

After satisfying her voracious appetite for Shakespeare's works, Amelie found herself drawn to the other curiosities in Monsieur's collection. He had books of every length, language, and discipline; architecture, art, illusion, history; books in English, French, Italian, and Persian; funny stories, long stories, tragic stories; mythology, fiction, non-fiction, encyclopedias; and perhaps most extensive of all, music. His collection did not consist only of scores and sheet music, though there had to have been at least hundreds of those. Monsieur had quite obviously studied all kinds of histories of music, beginning with Gregorian chants that developed into polyphonic organum in Notre Dame, to the development of musical notation, and so on all the way through the works of Mozart and even the most recent works by Wagner and his contemporaries.

Duly noting that she could in fact recreate the entire development of all civilization through such extensive histories, Amelie found herself consistently drawn to the more modern works of Gothic writers. At first she thought it was simply morbid curiosity, besides she had never really read the macabre, sometimes even sensual and violent, works that had become so prominent in the past decades. Then Amelie realized it was the all-encompassing darkness finally worming itself into her psyche. The more she read, the more she felt the hunger for the grotesque and shocking nature and the more at peace she felt in her underground home.

Given her mother's unabashed adoration for modern female authors, Amelie always fancied herself a writer in her own way. In her spare time, she often found herself scribbling short stories (of an admittedly pedantic nature) and translating her own perspectives and insights into poetry. As of late, she scribbled notes to herself about Edgar Allen Poe's writing. Oh, if only she could translate her own interpretation of her situation and surroundings into such words! Sometimes Amelie would get lost in his ramblings, but the use of vivid imagery and visceral sensations always brought her back to main events.

 _Eleonora,_ the story of Poe's first and only great love, consumed Amelie's mind almost completely over the past few weeks. She would often dream about the blades of grass kissing the skin on her forearm and cheek; sitting under the vast, sheltering branches of a tree by the river; the bright, staccato song of birds and crickets; and the quiet comfort and tender company of someone she loved dearly and completely. Then she imagined the relentless, ominous presence of Death seeping into the wonderful scenery. The grasses shrivel and disintegrate, the tree's branches lose their leaves and become jagged and horrid, the birds do not sing, and then love shared turns to love lost. Amelie wondered why she did not notice the same shadow and cold in Soucia as Death's long, thin hands reached out to her mother. It seemed no evil could stain the beauty of the lake country. To her, Soucia would always be the most beautiful place in the world.

After her father's death, Amelie had to go back not to indulge any form of nostalgia or sentimentality, but simply because she did not know where else to go. Immediately after her father's death, she had packed up their belongings to return to Soucia to stay with her uncle, Henri, until she could determine the most suitable progression of events. What did she want? In Paris, her ambitions were simple. She wanted to continue working as a governess, perhaps pursue writing, and eventually, she would like to meet her Mr. Rochester or her Heathcliff (albeit without the horridness of the story that followed young love); but of course all on her own terms and in her own time.

After trudging and crawling desperately through the grief of losing both her parents, Amelie could not push one obsession from her mind. She felt as if she needed to go to Prussia and find her mother's family. It seemed asinine to seek out the same relatives that had cast her mother off before Amelie's birth, but without her parents Amelie felt paralyzingly small and alone. Everyday she woke with her heart pounding with painful force in her chest and with each breath trapped in her lungs, her palms would grow icy to the point that her fingers hurt and her vision would blur until she thought she would pass out or simply die altogether. It was a horrible, agonizing, and relentless way to live, and Amelie desperately needed something, some _one_ , to hold onto.

" _Mon oncle_ ," Amelie started one day as she poured evening tea for the two. "I believe I shall return to Paris by the end of the week. I have written to an acquaintance there who has offered a position as a governess with a well-to-do family in the city."

"But Amelie, _mon cher!_ " He gasped. His red face and glassy eyes betrayed the intoxication in his veins. "I thought you had at last returned to Soucia to stay! Marta and Julien have done badly with you, you are as fickle and flighty as they were."

"Oh, but I have nothing else here," Amelie huffed. In her mind her cause was righteous, but she instantly heard how childish her words and actions sounded in that moment. "What would you have me do?"

"Well I wouldn't have you working in the house of a rich city family, with a hawkish madame and a lecherous monsieur! Why won't you stay in Soucia and _marry_?"

Ah. It was only a matter of time until he mentioned it again. Every evening since Amelie had returned, Henri mentioned marriage. He had gone through the list of eligible bachelors in the village, but Amelie had avoided the conversation completely.

"My father-your brother!-just passed away. I'm mourning," she would say as a means to excuse herself from the discussion.

"Uncle, you know I could not stay in Soucia and marry out of blind necessity, I would never be happy," Amelie replied. "I have to choose my own path not simply resign myself to marriage out of intellectual laziness. And Soucia is my home, it beats as part of my heart and the lake and river waters runs through my veins, but after staying here, I've realized I am not ready to return yet. I need to see more… I was thinking of going to Prussia, to find _mutti's_ family. We've never met and I think-"

Two rapid, crisp knocks echoed through the small, two-story, white brick country home. Henri's face grew even more rosy with excitement as his large, rotund figure waddled eagerly towards the door. Amelie remembered him as a younger, agile sailor who would always visit their kitchen with stories from the ports of Marseille and the beauty of Spain and Italy. He spent all his life traveling and often bragged about "boarding other men's ships" (a phrase Amelie had taken literally as a child, but now caused her to shudder at the more bawdy implication), but when he injured his back later in life he returned to Soucia alone. The wine kept him company most nights, and his figure resembled the fact.

"Monsieur Comtois, _bon nuit!_ "

"Theo, my boy! How wonderful of you to come all the way from the city, please join us!" Henri ushered in a well-dressed young man. He removed his top hat to expose perfectly wind-swept sandy-colored curls and his blue eyes immediately fell on Amelie.

"Amelie, heavens, you've grown so much since we last saw each other! Don't look so startled, do you really not recognize me?" The man was jovial and his eyes were kind, but Amelie did not recognize him. "Theo! It's me, Theo! Oh, how could you not remember?"

"Theo? But what are you doing here?" Amelie gasped. She wanted to smile, to feel the same joy at their reunion that he so manifestly displayed, but instead she felt a sense of discomfort and dread.

"Well, Amelie, first I want to convey my deepest condolences about the passing of your father," Theo moved briskly and confidently to where Amelie stood, took her hand in his, and led her to sit at the table. "Henri told my mother and she wrote me in Paris, and when I read that you were here and waiting, I wrote immediately to tell your uncle that…"

"Waiting? I don't understand, Uncle?" Amelie turned to see Henri smiling with eager eyes.

"Amelie, I currently work as a scrivener for a small Paris firm and as soon as I've finished the requisite schooling, I'll have a position there as a full lawyer as well. I'd like to take you back to the city with me and marry you."

Amelie knew her face must have displayed every ounce of unabashed confusion, because Theo grew more frantic as he continued.

"I know perhaps the timing seems a dash insensitive and hurried… I could have come to you later or waited and made a longer courtship, but I knew, or at least I remembered, that you were always so spirited and ambitious and you wouldn't wait. It's why I came here as soon as possible."

"Theo… I…" she struggled to find any words. "Uncle… you?"

"Theo and I discussed it in some detail…" Henri offered gently. "It would be such a wonderful match! You were such fast friends as children, and what other prospects do you have? Certainly none you know as well! And you love Soucia… why, you and Theo could return here to be closer to your dear uncle in a few years!"

"I have plenty of prospects!" Amelie replied with a childish indignance. "I have my own plan, wasn't I just telling you? I'm to return to Paris this week, and not as a bride. I'm sorry, Theo, but I can't accept a proposal. Not right now, and certainly not like this."

 _Thud_.

The characteristic sound of Monsieur slamming the door to his chamber echoed through the underground home by the lake and brought Amelie back to her present circumstance. Theo's sudden entrance and proposal seemed like a lifetime ago and as Monsieur approached the reading room they shared, Amelie couldn't help but smile to herself a bit. But the swell of pride and humor felt tinged by anxiety. _My own plans, indeed_.

"And what are we smiling about?" Amelie looked up at the full, white mask staring down at her. Monsieur's tone was unsettlingly calm, dare she say even jovial? His eyes, still exhibiting their characteristic glow, seemed muted and cloudy and his jacket and trousers smelled of sweet smoke.

"Pardon, monsieur, I meant no offense," She began. "I was just… reminiscing."

"Reminiscing over a work by Edgar Allen Poe?" Monsieur's body seemed to move heavily, without its characteristic grace and silence, as he dropped himself on the divan opposite of Amelie's chair. He seemed uncommonly favorable and, for the first time, his humor held no malice.

"Oh…" Amelie turned to book she held in her hands. Her mind had wandered so far that the catalyst of her introspection eluded her for a brief moment. "It wasn't about Poe, really. I've been reading _Eleonora_. It reminded me of my mother."

"She's dead?" Monsieur asked with genuine care, so far as Amelie could tell. His eyes wandered dreamily without plan or intention.

"Yes. She died when I was little, before my father and I came to Paris. I was raised in Soucia-"

"Ahh, the lake country. Lakes and mountains…. And rivers, and flowers… clean, soft rains… not like the muck that falls in Paris..."

Amelie furrowed her brow and stifled a smile.

"Yes… that would be an accurate synopsis, I suppose. But the scenes in _Eleonora_ lead me to visceral memories of the days spent by the lakes and lying in the grass. We would picnic together and _mutti_ would read me stories and poems and books. I attribute the sole blame, responsibility, and thanks to her for my love of literature. She enjoyed feminist authors, even dabbled a bit with political ideology, but nothing too radical for my father was much more conventional… But the feeling of the grass against my skin and the cold of the water… and there was so much _love_ in those days."

Amelie halted her brief rambling as she felt Monsieur's eyes come to rest on her own features. He was studying her like a traveler studies a map, looking for every holler, hill, river, and field, trying to memorize every secret and detail. A swell of sorrow engulfed her as she considered for a moment that he perhaps could not imagine such a time. What kind of childhood does a ghost have? Amelie searched his gold eyes, frustrated that the mask meant she could never see any of his features or expressions, but found no answers. He did not seem sad, simply fascinated.

"Have you read it? _Eleonora_?" asked Amelie.

"I've read everything here, mademoiselle," Monsieur replied, rolling onto his back again to stare off absently. Amelie felt emboldened by his suddenly more affable demeanor and considered sharing something more personal with him… something they could use to pass the time together. _Eleonora_ provided perhaps the most promising potential to nurture some semblance of solidarity between the two, so Amelie made her proposal carefully.

"Excellent… then you're familiar with the various settings he creates in the short story and the tragically lost love he describes," Amelie's continued despite her frantic nerves. "Well… I know the Phantom no longer composes, but maybe you would be interested in composing not as the Ghost, but as I see you before me now. As just a man, Monsieur."

Monsieur rolled over to face her again, his eyes gazing with a calm intensity and curiosity.

"Go on," He commanded.

"You see, Monsieur, I by no means fancy myself one of the greats, I'm no Shakespeare, no Poe, and certainly not a Bronte," Amelie continued. "But I have found that _Eleonora_ is broken into phases and would be easily adapted into opera. The first details the madness, or brilliance, of the author, which I have surmised into a reflection titled _Mare Tenebrarum_ , paraphrased into a short stanza. Then he speaks of _The Valley of Many-Colored Grasses_ , it seems mythical, the land on which he and Eleonora fell in love… this is the part that reminds me so much of Soucia. There's the opportunity for a beautiful aria which I've called the _Song of Ephemeron_ , which Poe uses to refer to Eleonora's magnificent and fleeting beauty. Then, I imagine a song between Eleonora and Death, a duet, when she realizes that he has marked her and her passing."

"What a grim exchange that must be," Monsieur interjected. Amelie couldn't help but smile along with his obvious amusement.

"Grim, yes, even more so when she realizes that she will pass and Poe will continue on, likely to love another. She sees the fleeting nature of youthful love. But," Amelie now felt herself gesturing wildly as her imagination overcame all composure and anxiety. "Poe overhears the exchange. He is heartbroken at the news of her death, but he makes a solemn promise to the gods and to Eleonora that he will never love or marry again, and that's another composition there. Finally, in the last moments, the _Song of the River of Silence_ plays and with Poe's hand grasping hers, she finally falls into Death's arms leaving Poe alone."

"A horrible, painful, and accurate rendition of love and love lost," Monsieur's glazed eyes danced with a spark for the briefest moment and Amelie imagined that was what he looked like when inspiration took hold.

"I have an outline, Monsieur," Amelie offered. "In my chambers. I could fetch it for you, if you like. Of course it's not complete, but there are some words and phrases."

"You would have us write an opera together?" He asked, the glowing eyes resting even more intently on her still. She felt the same pang of disdain for the mask. It was a brick wall between her and him, unnerving her and brusquely halting her attempts to understand Monsieur.

"I would," Amelie replied resolutely. "If I am to stay here for the rest of our lives, we will need something to pass the time. This way, we need not even speak, really. I have no business writing music and so would not bother your composition at all. I need only provide you with the words."

"What a ridiculous statement," Monsieur stood from where he sat. "As if a writer has no business ensuring their words are adequately embodied in the sounds presenting them."

"Well certainly I could only listen then," Amelie countered. "I have never even seen an opera before, only heard the crash of drums and symbols from outside the Opera House. I am confident that you would provide "adequate" accompaniment."

"Perhaps… but that's the beauty of music. One need not be a composer to feel it and understand it." Monsieur paced the room in front of Amelie. "It's rather humorous, mademoiselle; In truth, you are no more a timid and austere governess than I am a ghost."

Amelie smiled.

"Few people are born austere, and even fewer born as ghosts," She replied. "We are simply what is required of us, I suppose."


	6. The Opera Ghost

**A/N: Hey y'all! I know that last chapter was a doozie (3k+ words, whoops!), so thanks to everyone who stuck with it! Special thanks to my beta Kaylyn Palmeter and LadyKatana4544. You guys are the best!**

 **Special thanks to Kaylyn Palmeter for the new summary, too! I'm really awful at trying to keep it brief, so I think she did a wonderful job. I made a few small edits but the bulk of that is her brain child.**

 **As always, please, please, please review. I see you reading. I know you're there. Let me know what you think, especially of this whole _Eleonora_ opera we've got going. I've been in a Poe kind of mind lately. :) **

**My best to you all, and happy reading!**

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Chapter 6: The Opera Ghost

 _Being surrounded in dreams by day, though mad it may seem,_

 _Is better than to dream by night and live only in one's sleep._

Erik read the words slowly hearing them reverberate in the walls of his mind as if spoken by another voice. He had once heard that to read in one's head with a voice, as opposed to simply seeing and processing the words, indicated less intelligence, but this was never the case with him. When he read Edgar Allen Poe, poems it was with a somber voice fascinated with death; when he heard music, each line sounded in his mind with the designated instrument; and now, as he read these words, he heard Amelie's soft, hesitant articulation resonating within him.

Reading her interpretation of _Eleonora_ made Erik feel vastly more connected to this stranger than he had to any human since _Christine_.

Curses!

Would he ever be able to mention his beloved soprano's name, even in his most private thoughts, without a grimace and a gut-wrenching tightness in his chest? Perhaps not… Erik certainly could not bring himself to even hope for as much. In a twist of irony, Christine was now the ghost that haunted him and sang songs in his head… he would have given anything in the world to hear the voice in his mind singing one of the arias they had practiced together or even intruding with just her vocal warmups, but it was always her words for the Vicomte that preyed upon what little sanity he might have left. _One love. One lifetime._

Erik shook his head and smoothed down his black hair, trying desperately to return himself to the work at hand. _Mare Tenebrarum_ was the first group of words (they were so unstructured that Erik scrupled to call them stanzas) that Amelie had provided. She had done so with such endearing hesitance. Erik found it amusing and empowering at the same time. Here this girl who, in sickening self-sabotage disguised as an ode to free will, had chosen to join him in his tomb with cool confidence now trembled like a small child handing their letters to their teacher. She eagerly awaited his judgement.

The words were good, albeit simple in their imagery and childish in their rhymes but in some ways Erik felt the simplicity of her rhyming and interpretation lended itself to the task at hand. For _Mare Tenebrarum_ , her stanzas were lacking punctuation and seemed to jump without warning from one idea to the next. It was confusing to read… as one would expect of the ramblings of a mad man reflecting on the loss of his great love. Though the melody itself evaded him, Erik could imagine the sweet, sumptuous dissonance surrounding the words and an urgent staccato to emphasize the sudden changes in his tenor's words. And it would, of course, be a tenor singing this part. The words he read in Amelie's voice, but the singing was his own.

His eyes finally fell upon the last line and the music of it swept over him in an urgent simultaneity of top-down and bottom-up orchestral movements joining at last in a strong resolution on the tonic chord, but with the close dissonance of half-steps undermining the warmth.

 _And mad is the only thing worthy of being_.

The more he read, the more he felt the gravity of his words to Amelie. Though she presented herself as somber and sedate, Erik knew something else lay behind this facade. A sardonic grin threatened the corner of his lips as he realized they both wore masks of their own. But he knew enough about masks to know that one should not carelessly pry to examine what lies beneath. Erik harbored no further curiosity towards Amelie's true disposition. He simply wanted to see more of her work in hopes that it would continue to stir music in his mind.

Amelie, on the other hand, seemed scarcely able to govern her own inquisitiveness. To Erik's relief, she directed none of her keen fervor towards his mask, or really anything about him for that matter. She, like him, simply wanted to know about the work. Even now, as he sat locked in his own chambers away from her adamant, inquisitive eyes, he could still sense her pacing the small space of the sitting room. It was distracting. Amelie paced and the small taps of her feet against stone reverberated endlessly in his mind, while the occasional _tink_ made when she set her tea down on the small ceremonial plate pierced his ears, compounded by her huffs and sighs, building into an intolerable crescendo when she threw herself onto the divan by the fire. Erik knew he had to make it stop, more than anything in the world, he needed the sounds to stop.

"Are you not yet satisfied with the racket you've created?" He snapped as he stormed into the living room. She looked at him with anticipation, but not fear, and her tone was placid as the surface of the lake when she replied.

"I meant no offense, Monsieur. I was not aware that my actions would disturb you, I thought myself silent as a mouse."

"A mouse with a marching band!" Erik retorted. He felt a small pang of guilt for bombarding her with his cynical jabs. Of course Amelie could not fathom that walking wordlessly in a separate room would cause Erik such distress. Of course she could not know that his senses and reflexes were so accustomed to the underground world they lived in that every sound was as loud as a symphony in his mind. Nonetheless he could not stifle the bitter sarcasm within him.

"Well, if I may ask, since you have now left your work for a moment, Monsieur, what is your opinion thus far?"

"I can see why you're a governess, not a playwright," Erik replied, not at all surprised by the heavy, patronizing tone of his voice. "But the words do have their moments…"

"I'll work on it, then," Amelie offered. If she were even the least bit offended by his remarks, her voice and manner did not show it. _It's the mask_ , Erik told himself. But the eager, boyish fraction of his soul told him to hope… maybe she was simply learning to accept his callous attitude.

And those were the only words the two shared that day, and the next, and the next. Amelie continued to put tea outside of his chambers everyday, sometimes even twice, and periodically, he would find himself wandering into the sitting room to find her reading _Eleonora_. The degree of obsessiveness she demonstrated reminded Erik of himself as a young boy. While held hostage in his mother's home, he had the luxury of immense and inexhaustible time, which he would fervently funnel to whatever passing triviality had caught his fancy that day. Erik couldn't help but wonder, as he watched Amelie's eyes dart from the end of line to the start of another, if that was what genius looked like. Erik had always harbored the assumption that his mind, while exceptionally adept, only grew so formidable and astounding in every field due to his persistent labors. He was not immensely talented, the human race was simply immensely lazy by comparison. And perhaps before entering his home, Amelie had been no different. But now, in this place, Erik could see the gears of her mind turning in perfect sync and had no doubt that her revisions would please him.

Despite such optimism, Erik could not stifle the toxic and viciously insatiable monster within him that simply demanded more. When she gave him a slice of the words in her mind, the monster grew more fervent and savage in its pursuit to devour that entire part of her. And it did not hesitate to unleash dark, diabolical attacks upon her in pursuit of its goal.

" _You_ proposed this, and now you have nothing to give at all?" He flared.

"Monsieur, please, what is the rush? We have all the time we could possibly need. There's no deadline, no commission to uphold… it's just us."

"There is always rush to create!" He cried with equal parts exhilaration and frustration. "It must be done now, there is nothing else until it is finished!"

"Your dedication warms me, Monsieur," Amelie replied with her customary earnest tone. Typically he would appreciate her meekness, but now it only caused the blood to pump loudly and relentlessly in his veins. Was she mocking him? His hands grew restless, clenching into fists repeatedly of their own accord.

"Warms you? I don't want to _warm_ you or coddle you, I want you to do what you've promised. Why does the Phantom keep you alive if all you want to do is torment him and taunt him?"

Amelie's expression indicated her befuddlement, but she did not shrink away from the prospect of a threat. The pounding in his ears grew louder and his hands stopped their fervent dance as one of them found his lasso.

"He could snap your neck in an instant, don't you know that? Did you think that just because you had ensnared the Phantom with this little project that he would forget you were his prisoner? You are _in my service_ ," The last words hissed and sneered from Erik with a condescension that stifled even himself. Amelie rose and a swell of pride overcame him in the moment he thought she might try to flee.

"I apologize, Monsieur," she said with a small curtsy. "It was never my intention to question your authority nor my own status. I am as much at your service now as I was the first day we met."

The violent pounding of his precocious pulse seemed to quiet and slow into a seething frustration. Her humility goaded him towards horrible action, but he never harmed another human without the fortitude brought by terrifyingly calm and calculated actions.

"Why do you not fear me?" the words freed themselves from Erik's mind in an uncharacteristic lapse of control and he grinded his teeth against one another in punishment.

"Fear you, Monsieur?" Amelie smiled weakly. Though she did not seem frightened, Erik noticed the corners of her mouth set downward, and a crease, gentle and symmetrically placed between her brow, indicated that her facade did not escape these assaults uninjured. "I do fear you… sometimes, the viciousness of your words frightens me. But you are only a man."

 _Only a man_. She had said the words before, each time emphasizing them and presenting them to him with heedful determination.

"A man who has killed, and would not hesitate to do so again," Erik retorted. It felt odd to hear his own words attach a human label to himself. In another place and another time, Erik would have loathed such an association.

"Man does not kill without cause; and the cause is usually fear," Amelie's warm, hazel eyes found his in the darkness. "I do not fear death from you because I do not believe you fear me… not enough to kill, at least."

Erik had never considered this before. He couldn't help but close his eyes in a pained wince as he remembered the first time he had killed… the Gypsy man, Javert. Erik had always told himself that he stabbed the man because he hated him beyond description, because in one moment the gypsy had pushed him too far beyond what he could tolerate. Of course, there had been fear in the moment. But Erik had pushed it aside so quickly, enough so that he could present himself as ready to supplicate any desires and demands. Had he felt fear when the sharp blade glided through the folds of fat and skin? And did he feel fear when he plunged it again into the gypsy's throat? Fear was not the sentiment that most haunted him in that moment, that honor belonged to satisfaction.

Erik could not, however, recall any other incident in which murder placated his soul and brought him joy. Quite the contrary in fact. Every life he took fractured his soul a little more and drove him closer to madness, but fear and spite forced him fervently towards murder. Fear and spite until Christine, that is. Those attacks were the result of unfettered and uncaged lust in all its forms. Every piece of him _needed_ Christine, beyond poetry or description or sound, and his mind unhinged as she slipped out of his violent grip.

He felt a fraction of that lust now. Erik craved Amelie's words and needed them because they seemed the only thing that could bring him closer to the one God he worshipped and believed in: music. Who was this girl, this _interloper_ , to deny him any inspiration?

"Beyond that, Monsieur," Amelie continued, searching his face (or the mask that shielded it) for something Erik knew he would not provide. "There is nothing you can take from me. I arrived here with nothing but my will, my freedom, and my soul. Death would not allow you to steal those from me."

"What idle, depraved logic is this?" Erik sneered. "You value your will and your liberty more than your life?"

"I value that which I will maintain for all eternity more than any earthly construct."

For the second time as he stood opposite the occupier, Erik felt his grip on the lasso slacken. Pity stayed his hand. What a poor, confused wretch. He knew the nature of women tended towards overly emotional and hysterical, but this demonstration exceeded all expectations. In some sort of desperate attempt to preserve herself, Erik realized Amelie had in truth condemned herself. Of course she could remain composed and stony in the face of his threats, for she put no value upon her own self and well-being.

"You're pathetic…" He muttered as he turned away from her.

"Pathetic?" Amelie's tone was fiery and resentful. "Pathetic? I quite loathe such a judgement, when all I have done is withstood your attempt to flatten and control me. I see no reason to tolerate such behavior!"

Her words resonated in the walls and stood silently between them until a faint chirp and chitter echoed from the distance. Amelie let out an eager exclamation before rushing out of the house to the ledge by the lake and Erik took the opportunity to excuse himself. Let the poor creature play with her little pet. Heaven knows the songbird was all of value she had left.


	7. The Phantom

**A/N: Two chapters! One night! What insanity! I've got the next few chapters written, and I'm really eager to get them out there. But please review, or I'll be forced to keep second guessing myself and withhold publication until Kaylyn (beta), my sister, my friends, my cats, etc., all get a chance to read and give me feedback (:**

 **Thanks as usual, as always, to betas Kaylyn and LadyKatana. You guys rock!**

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Chapter 7: The Phantom

Amelie heard Feste singing in the darkness but as she rushed towards the song, she could not see him. What a fickle friend! It was the same thing every time. She could hear him, but the song remained just out of reach, available but unattainable. How could he always be just out of her sight and just out of her grasp? Why did he fear her so?

Amelie returned to the house on the lake only to find the Phantom had retired to his room once again. This night, she did not make him tea. Why would she? His declarations of her value as a human being scorned the most prideful portion of her soul, and Amelie found herself fuming at the thought of it. How could a man who lived underground, hidden behind a mask, deem her "pathetic"? The thought made her blood boil. Men were always so quick to judge a woman; by her appearance, by her clothes, and by her family, but never by her words or the content of her character! But this man… he had listened to Amelie's passionate declarations, only to degrade her for her ability to take satisfaction from her own values!

Despite her refusal to provide the Phantom with her evening offering, Amelie still found herself eager to provide Feste with his nightly rations. As she returned to the ledge on the lake to fetch his plate, Amelie contemplated how she wanted to capture his nature in the _Song of the Ephemeron_ ; his beauty, the beauty of the hope he provided to her while she lived in this forsaken tomb, was ethereal and fleeting, just like Eleonora's. Available, but attainable, as Poe would realize and lament.

In a strange twist of fate, however, it was Feste that brought the reality of Amelie's situation to mind. As part of her evening custom, Amelie usually prepared tea for herself and Monsieur, then she took a plate of torn bread pieces out to Feste. Though on that evening, her hand fell empty and Amelie realized they had no more bread. How long had it been since she consumed anything of substance? She had nibbled at a piece of stale bread the previous day, or maybe it was the day before that?, but apart from those few morsels, Amelie felt a sickening jab in her stomach that betrayed her hunger.

And now that she had realized her imminent starvation, the cupboards were empty. Monsieur had made it clear he did not take meals, which explained the sharp, bony joints and his thin, stiff, wiry frame. Perhaps he could subsist on tea and wine and whatever it was that seeped smoke into her living room through the shared ventilation system, but she certainly could not! This was one confrontation on which Amelie could not compromise. So that same evening, Amelie's pride gave way so that she could bring the Phantom a small offering of tea… heavens knows she would do anything she could to put him in the best spirits possible before making her proposal. She curled her small hands into a fist, tensed her shoulders, and took a deep breath. Then, she knocked.

In an instant, in the moment she had made contact with the door and before she could even muster a second rap, the Phantom met her at the door. The gold, glowing eyes gave way to the same glaze and for the first time, Amelie was close enough to see more details around his mask. The skin around his jaw and hairline was little more than a paper-thin veil covering veins and sinew that pumped and tensed as he opened his mouth to speak. Before he could form the words, a small gasp of horror escaped her lips, and she could see the eyes beyond the mask narrow in anger.

"I apologize, Monsieur, you frightened me. I hadn't even knocked a second time and then-"

"Do not lie, woman, you're an abysmal liar. The Phantom has heard worse than gasps at the prospect of his face," She could smell the sweet, spicy aroma of the smoke on his breath and clothes again.

"I do apologize for that, as well, Monsieur," She replied softly with as much courage as she could muster. "I've never… it just startled me."

"Luckily for you I am too intoxicated for rage," the Phantom said with strange, silky, song-like tones. He backed away from the door opening his chamber to her. A desk covered in parchment scribbled with notes lay before her in one corner of the room while a black, beckoning and ominous, coffin lay in the center of the room.

"You… do not sleep in a bed?" Amelie inquired with significant hesitation. It felt wrong to pry so much. Their entire coexistence had flourished only because she did not pry. Hostility was a defense mechanism, the same way a dog bites when it is cornered or a horse kicks when it is startled. In a similar fashion, monsieur's disposition was thorny at best and violent when agitated even the slightest but Amelie found it only another mask to disguise his fear. Amelie's wrist bore bruises from the first time he found her rearranging objects Christine had left strewn about the home; a pair of shoes here, a glove there… Amelie could infer that the prima donna was not the tidiest or most stringent of women. So Amelie did her best to never approach him at all and this safe distance had permitted her a certain degree of security. But, in this case, the curiosity of the coffin was simply too much to bear.

"Death's bed for a "death's head"," the Phantom replied. "That's what they used to say around the Opera House, before my untimely demise so many months ago. It's part of the despicable, pathetic nature of humans. You all scorn so viciously that which you do not understand…"

Amelie blinked. And how was she supposed to respond to such a comment? Instinctively, she could only apologize.

"Pardon me, Monsieur… I truly did not intend to-"

"Enough of your contritious apologies. You cannot atone for the human race or a lifetime of gasps and jabs and tortures. But you came here. What do you want?"

"I must tell you, I have recently taken an inventory… we will need more food soon. I use the word "inventory" quite unceremoniously… it was not so much a task seeing as we have no food. I have not eaten in days."

"In days?" Amelie frowned, confused by the worry in his voice. "Ah… of course...and you have realized you cannot leave but I cannot simply roam the streets during the day either. So what is to be done?"

Amelie could not decipher his tone. The question seemed genuine enough and certainly merited an answer, but a dark humor pervaded his diction and made her hesitant to reply.

"It was not rhetorical," said the Phantom. They still stood uncomfortably in the doorway. The hazy room was open to Amelie, but like his question, she could not decide whether it was intentional or by some sort of cynical design. Whatever the case, he had demanded that she never enter his chamber… and Amelie was not foolish enough fall prey to any of his traps so easily.

"Well, how had you acquired provisions previously?" She asked instead, crossing her arms defiantly.

"An intelligent approach..." He replied musingly with a divinely soft sigh. Amelie felt a small swell of pride at his approval, but quickly scolded herself for such childishness. "During my years managing the Opera, I had unfettered access to the kitchens at night and before that I paid for the convenience of someone else shopping for me. Since the rather unfortunate events preceding your arrival, Madame Giry would provide me with items I requested."

"Cognac and bread and cheese, Monsieur?" She offered with a wary smile.

"Indeed," He nodded. "And yet, since leaving you down here across the lake, Madame Giry has made no attempt to return to or contact either of us."

The thought angered Amelie. It was one thing to bring an unsuspecting, desperate girl down into the bowels of the old opera house and abandon her to the whims of the Phantom (and quite an evil thing at that), but to leave her forever without so much as inquiring to whether she were alive or dead escalated the Madame to a new stratosphere of wretched in her mind. For pity's sake, the woman could have at least left some food!

"Perhaps you have means of writing her?" Amelie offered.

"Do not say stupid things. It doesn't suit you, mademoiselle," the Phantom replied sternly. Though seemingly somewhat sedated, the Phantom had lost none of the ominous threatening tones in his voice. "How do you expect I receive mail here? Do you believe _la poste_ ventures from their well-trodden streets to my depths to deliver letters? No, Madame Giry and the trap doors were my post service before."

"Then if it is to be just you and I, Monsieur, perhaps we must come to an arrangement of our own."

"How very astute of you," The response was sarcastic and Amelie could sense him grow weary of their exchange. He moved away from her to take a long pipe made from a dark, engraved jade into his skeletal hands. He held it over a small oil lamp until it began to smoke, then the Phantom inhaled deeply for what seemed like a full minute at least. In only moments, she saw his body relax and she knew the reason for his sudden patience. The Phantom, Monsieur, drowned himself in alcohol and burned himself numb in succession with opium.

"Monsieur, the only arrangements possible are as follows: you venture out at night and steal provisions for the rest of our days or we go to the markets during the day in disguise." Amelie did her best to push the revelation from her mind. _He is just a man._

" _Disguise?_ " Poison in his words. "As if I do not wear a mask all my days anyway, you recommend a disguise? A mask for a mask?"

"No, Monsieur, please you asked for my suggestion and I ask in return that you listen to it in its entirety," She replied hotly. "All of Paris has heard of the porcelain mask that covers the Phantom. Your mask is no disguise. Sometimes the best way to hide is to make oneself manifest. To hide in plain sight, as they say."

"Continue," the Phantom urged ominously as he set the pipe carefully in a velvet box. His glowing, hazy eyes stared never left Amelie as he did so and her quivering hands betrayed her nerves.

"I read once of the leper colonies throughout Europe. Though secluded, the poor souls would sometimes still go into the streets and markets. They would walk near the gutters, hooded and covered in cloaks with gloved hands and wrapped faces, ringing a small bell as they walked to warn others that an infected person approached. I have heard them occasionally in the streets of Paris. As you may know, the disease has become much less common and so some of the younger children do not know the meaning of the bell. Nonetheless, when the sound fills the street the warning spreads like wildfire."

"You reduce the Phantom to a disease! Demand he carry a bell to warn the world of his wretchedness!" the Phantom began pacing the floor clenching his fists in unconscious repetition. Amelie's mouth gaped. His mood had changed so quickly; irritation turned to wild anger, even in spite of the fresh dose of opium coursing through his body.

"I beg your pardon, Monsieur!" Amelie cried in dismay. "But please, understand, I know no other way. I do not wish to degrade or insult you, but if you will not show your face then we must find a way to avoid curious eyes or we will surely starve down here!"

"You snake, you claim you would not degrade "Monsieur", but you _would_ lure him out into the streets and escape!" The Phantom snapped. Amelie could make out his eyes widening behind the mask as he continued in bewilderment. "That's all this is! A cruel charade! You thought you could live with the Opera Ghost, learn his secrets, and gain his trust then leave the Phantom to tell the world what you have learned! You treacherous little spy!"

"Gain his trust? What version of trust do you exercise, Monsieur?" Amelie retorted, determined to counter his volley at every strike. "You speak of a version of me that simply does not exist. I have shown no interest in your secrets, we barely exchange words and what little we do speak truly only amounts to insults and abuses you jubilantly hurl at me. And you speak of escape! Escape! As if I have anywhere to go! Haven't we already discussed my lack of fortune and prospects? I _chose_ this fate. It is of my own will, my own volition."

"And who would chose such a fate!" The Phantom paced wildly before her. His hands with their long, bony fingers shook violently and his breath grew frantic and ragged. "Who would choose the Devil's Child?"

"I did! I would rather be here than destitute, and so I would always make the same choice. But all you have given me in exchange for my companionship is death threats and bruises!" Amelie held her bruised wrists up defiantly.

"Enough of this!" he bellowed with a menacing finger pointed in Amelie's direction. The beautifully threatening song of the Phantom's voice no longer existed. In its place was a guttural shout, a horrible pained sound that would ring in Amelie's ears for months to come. "I will not allow you to parade me through the streets like a monster- _come see the Devil's Child, he carries a bell_ \- whispering to the shop keepers as you pass- _The Angel of Death, behold his illusions_ -tell them of my cave and my prison and how I hold you here- _The monstrous Opera Ghost! behold his tortured face_. Bring the mob, and tie him up to hang, hear the bell ring as his neck snaps! Behold the Devil's Child!"

His words of madness echoed through the caverns as he overturned the desk's layers of sheet music, spilling ink and ruining the notes and arrangements for _Eleonora_. Drunk and inebriated on his own rage, the Phantom smashed a liquor bottle against the cold stone walls as he shouted his morbid narrative. Finally, Amelie felt hot tears force their way free from her eyes, blurring her vision as she watched the Phantom's fuming, furious figure retreat across the room from her. She fell to her knees in exhaustion and sadness.

"No, Monsieur," she whispered softly from the frame of the doorway. "I could never do such a thing. What a cruel vision of the world––of me––you must hold."

Amelie thought she heard him whimper in the shadows.

"I will retire now, if it pleases you," She rose carefully as his back was turned to her and she wished not to startle him.

He uttered no words to her as she moved to return to her rooms, but through the silence Amelie thought she could hear the Feste's sad chorus off in the distance. Or perhaps she was simply growing mad.


	8. The Compromise

**A/N: Okay this is I think the longest Chapter I'm going to write, and I thought about breaking it into 2, but what the heck, it fits the flow better to have it all in one. Just get ready for some good ol' Erik introspection!**

 **I'm working really hard on these next few chapters to come, but they are much more difficult to write… so much is going to happen! I wrote through Chapter 9 very quickly when this idea first sprang into my mind, and so writing these early chapters has really just been a process of expanding ideas and then editing them. These later chapters, including 9 itself, have yet to be fully considered and written, so I might need a bit more time before posting those.**

 **That being said, let's talk about some points in y'all's reviews!**

Sue (Guest): If I were Amelie, I think I'd much rather take my chances in Paris as well! All she had to do was save up money and go to Germany to find her family, and then I'd be writing a very different story. As it were, she's kind of impulsive and spiteful so she had to do something drastic and even self-deprecating. _Sigh._

Wheel of Fish: First of all, AH! Your reviews made my day and your insight got me thinking about some things I hadn't fully considered; for example: Erik killing the prostitutes. Why did he do that? It certainly is out of character for the Leroux/Kay Erik who kills a little less jovially than ALW Phantom; I guess I felt that he was in such a horribly low place that he felt gravely insulted, injured, and terrified; he couldn't just let them leave, could he?

Amelie is complex (I hope) and kind of silly in some aspects. She thinks of herself as hot-headed and rebellious, but she also puts on this act of the perfect governess, meaning that she does want to uphold social norms to some extent. She _wants_ to play by the rules, and is really quite good at it.

Madame Giry pulled a fast one; why she thought it a good idea to keep trying to force Erik to have friends I think stems from the fact that she knows he needs one, but is completely unwilling to do it herself. I don't blame her, but I also like to think I wouldn't have just left a poor girl in a cellar and then never checked up on her again, jeez!

 **As always, please review! I love the insight and the responses.**

 **Enjoy Chapter 8!**

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Chapter 8: The Compromise

Erik's rage quickly gave way to despondency. The girl's face had held such hope and earnestness as she proposed a means by which they could roam the streets together. Again, Amelie had come to him like a humbled child and presented him with a plan that would award them both some degree of freedom. She was so naive!

How could she demand that he voluntarily appear as a leper? Of course he was familiar with such ostracization that the condition would undoubtedly entail. When Erik swore to himself during the Prussian invasion that he would build a home for himself under the Opera House, the salvation lay in the fact that he no longer needed to interact with the hostile streets or the monsters that roamed them. No, he had spent his life shunned and despised because of his all-encompassing ugliness; he was born a corpse and he knew by now that the world could never forgive him such an atrocity. But for his sole companion to think of him as nothing more than a poor, sickened soul, reminded him too much of Christine. The wound his soprano had left was still open and pussing.

He had truly grown to think of Amelie has a companion. Of course he never forgot the Mademoiselle Comtois was his prisoner; her silence and subservience reminded him of that. But she was here and she had not yet tried to escape… at least to his knowledge. Had she tried, the governess would have forced his hand towards murder again. The idea of harming and killing women never sat well with Erik, but in his desperation, when left with no other options, he knew he would do whatever he needed to in order to protect himself. He had done so before and thought he could be capable of doing so again. To Erik's distress but also in her favor, Amelie was a clever thing, and so perhaps she would be able to hide any attempts at escape if she had sought them. Then again, Erik also realized she still stumbled in the darkness and clumsily fumbled with the door and the drawers of Christine's vanity. No, the governess could not have sought escape if she had wanted to, not without wreaking such havoc as to draw his attention.

Then there was the small matter of Amelie also bringing him tea every day. It was such a simple and uncomplicated gesture, a kindness that would have been overlooked by anyone familiar with simple pleasantries, but it was more than Erik had received from anyone before. Even more surprising, she did it without attention or recognition. She would not knock at his door or disturb him when she left a small tray outside his room, nor did she say any words as she silently placed the small cup beside him as he read or sketched. Had Erik's senses not held their capacity for perfect perception, he would not have even noticed Amelie had completed her small act of kindness at all. She acted with no desire for praise. She seemed only simply caring and selfless.

And she brought him inspiration in the form of _their opera._ If _Don Juan_ was meant to be his climactic triumph, then Erik hoped _Eleonora_ could act as a sweet and silencing denouement. Amelia had made it such a painless experience thus far. Of course, Erik had yet to write any music of substance, but occasionally a juxtaposed playful and melancholy motif would dance through his mind. In these moments he would drop his sketches or his wine or his pipe and scribble what he could, but the notes were so elusive! His muddled mind could not manage to maintain clarity long enough to grasp the songs in his head.

If Amelie had noticed his continuous, relentless decline into, what Erik only dreamed could become a constant, opium and alcohol intoxicated state, she had not mentioned it. But of course she hadn't! How could he expect her to _care_? She did not know his name and they had exchanged so few words, the most extensive conversations being when she proposed _Eleonora_ and the second when he had verbally assaulted her for it and her most recently concocted fantasy. Most of their interactions, if they could even be called such, involved Amelie reading and scribbling as Erik watched intently. He had grown fond of the way her lips twitched when her eyes fell upon the puns and humorous facades or the way her thick, dark brows furrowed with anticipation of the conflicts, though she already knew their resolution. Once, as she read _Love's Labour's Lost_ , he caught her look up to him eagerly with a grin and open her mouth as if to share the joke with him. But she quickly thought better of it and, with a small pout, engrossed herself in her story once more.

Erik enjoyed the hope and innocence with which Amelie pursued her friendship with the mysterious songbird that called in the caverns. He overheard her once refer to him as Feste and thought her symbolism clever. Just like Feste, the bird would sing it's song as a servant does for its master, but it roamed through the shadows with an uncharacteristic autonomy. Erik pitied her though; she favored Feste's company to Erik's yet it was unattainable. She would prefer to sing songs, with painfully broken pitch and rhythm, to the bird than try to summon the songs from Erik's mind, but the bird would not allow her such a small joy. Not even once. Nonetheless, she set out a small pile of bread for it daily before retiring.

Perhaps her most profoundly frustrating quality, in Erik's mind, lie in Amelie's twisted life philosophy. She could not be tamed beyond her obvious facade of unassertive, compliant governess because she felt she had nothing to lose. Erik remembered feeling the same way in his youth as he spent his time wandering the planet, albeit he _truly_ had nothing to lose. As a reject of family and society it's easier to justify one's nihilism. But Amelie did not seem to experience such from a point of emptiness and cynicism. Instead she felt empowered and gracious in her beliefs. Nonetheless, Erik could not help but pity her. This quality made her reckless and even self-destructive, as if she were testing her own confidence in such beliefs. _But she is young_ , Erik told himself. _She has so many years left ahead of her to learn._

Despite all her endearing quirks and the small joy of her company, her suggestion to parade him through town with a bell on his neck like livestock (and worthless, diseased livestock at that!) caused him to curse her and wreak ruinous havoc on her attempts at organizing their shared living space. Oh, his words were so sinister. They were exactly as he intended them in the moment. He had wanted to maul her and maim her for her insolent and cruel suggestion. His words were intended to cause injury and indeed they had. But they had wounded him as well. When he heard her crumble to the ground and lament his twisted perception of her nature, Erik could not help but let out a sad groan of his own. And the bruises on her wrist! It was easy to harm another when Erik found himself consumed by his temper, but to see the consequences of his actions painted plainly in purples and blues across her porcelain skin left him profoundly unsettled. Why must he harm her so?

Amelie shut herself in her room, after so politely and obediently making her exit known (must she always be so cordial!), to shelter herself from his vicious words. Erik waited until silence had befallen the small abode before approaching her chamber with silent steps and opening the door just enough to peer inside. She slept soundly, curled up so small as if trying to disappear. Woe and deep, seething frustration engulfed Erik as he concluded that she had bundled herself together in weary defense from him. What a brutish monster he had been!

Erik knew he had to make amends. But how? Since she had so gracelessly splashed her way to the banks of his home, Amelie had made no demands. She asked few questions and neither mentioned or behaved as if she had any wants. Curse her trained subservience. Erik knew such behavior was not in her nature. The smallest of actions he observed had made it clear that she possessed a sense of strength and autonomy not common among young women, but she was ever cautious about her behavior.

As he imagined her small, soaked figure coming to him from the darkness, he remembered a detail they had both managed to overlook since her arrival. He considered the way Christine's garments constricted Amelie's larger frame. The object of his undying affections, the angel that haunted his dreams still, had been so perfectly crafted and so flawlessly proportioned that of course no mere mortal woman could be expected to compare. The governess had once mentioned she brought her own small collection of belongings that she had left on the banks of the lake opposite of them and yet neither of them had made an effort to retrieve it.

Stripping off his white tunic and boots, Erik waded into the frigid cold waters. They brought goosebumps to his skin but helped soothe his burning temper. And, as he approached the opposite shoreline of the great mass of water, he felt a childlike pride at the kindness and tenderness of his own actions. He then silently he swam back to the shore holding her small luggage case over his head and using only his thin, spidery legs to propel him back to the house on the lake. Erik returned to his desk, still dripping cold, clammy water carefully setting the case on the ground next to him, and dipped a quill in ink to write her a note of apology. With a sharp inhale, he readied his hand to express his sincere regret.

But the words would not come. He could not find them in himself. Oh, it was not a new sensation. Erik had never been particularly skilled at formulating apologies; even admitting himself at fault to a human being occurred only with great effort on his part. The Phantom's pride was not easily overcome. To make matters worse, since Christine had so horribly abandoned him all forms of expression evaded him-his music, his poetry, sometimes even his own breath and heartbeat, truly he felt so lonely that he suspected his very body would fail him of its own accord. As he wallowed in his complete incompetence, he felt shameful tears well in his eyes. His was a woefully inadequate existence. It was a failure in every way.

Resigned to his misery, he moved simply to leave the case outside Amelie's room, and returned to his own residence in pursuit of his own futile attempts at sleep. He knew he would undoubtedly fail in this, too.

Erik had not slept a single minute when he finally heard the faint sound of Amelie's door cautiously cracking open the following morning. He raised an eyebrow as he heard the clamor that could only have indicated her finding his small, humble symbol of atonement. Undoubtedly, she brashly moved from her chambers with the boldness that comes with the naive faith that the world is predictable and constant only to find that, in this instance, the powers that be had in fact put something in her place that was unpredictable and inconstant. He smiled to himself, a sensation both shocking but increasingly familiar. She was, indeed, so incredibly young. Young and full of hope and confidence and strength that Erik had lost long ago, if he had ever held it within him to begin with.

Where Erik had once worried and seethed about Christine's helplessness, her seemingly innate need to be cared for and led and protected, in the face of a world so cruel and unforgiving, he now found himself eager, but not desperate, to help Amelie preserve her more audacious nature. Amelie did not need to be cradled and raised from her own sadness. She did not need an Angel of Music or of Death or of any other kind. What this girl needed was a friend; someone to help her see her worth beyond the narrow scope of her own kaleidoscope version of the world in which her well-being is tied completely to her sexual decency or marital status.

Amelie had, in indirect but not uncertain terms, made it clear that she willingly placed herself at Erik's command in all areas except one: love, both of the emotional and physical form. While entirely reasonable, he found himself concerned that the strong, independent, feminist (as they had started calling themselves) woman before him could not seem to place value on any other part of her self, save her body and her love. In a funny way, Amelie had indeed made herself wholly bound by the same construct of the proprietary women that she had so forcefully fought against by refusing to marry. She needed someone to help her see this tremendous folly.

The well-aged and experienced Erik knew that such a venture was not within his abilities. He had curried favor with few people in his life and had managed something resembling a friendship with even fewer. Romance had consistently eluded him. There was no place for such endeavors in his existence, but still a piece of him yearned for the one joy of helping Amelie break free of her self-sustained prison. The callously analytical part of his mind had already diagnosed every ailment within this desire, however. First, Amelie was not his friend. Nadir had been his friend, at least until this last most horrendous run-in with Erik's torture chamber and certain other unfortunate events involving the siren… but apart from that most precarious of relationships, Erik had no experience with friendship.

What a fool he had been! To think that Christine could ever love him when he could not manage to nurture even one single human friendship! Of course, Erik could not have understood this at the time. The opium and the obsession brewed a most intoxicating stew of blinding, overpowering emotions. Erik would have given any of his limbs, his eyes, his tongue, if only he could have Christine… indeed, he gave her his music, the only thing he valued in all of existence. Despite the foolishness, despite the illogical nature of it all, Erik knew he would do it all exactly the same. He could do nothing but find Christine and love her and own her voice in every age and every time.

But he couldn't own Amelie! That was just the point of the entire exercise… But did Erik know any other way of interacting with another human? As a child, he could not know his mother's love, so instead he tormented her until he owned her very sanity; he owned Giovanni's heart because Erik was the son he never had and furthermore, Erik owned his daughter's heart (albeit by no design of his own); he owned Nadir for the briefest of times, until his mindfulness and strength of will broke free of Erik's voice; and he owned Christine's voice, her very soul, something that _damn boy_ could never own. It belonged to the Phantom!

Erik felt his pulse quicken and his fingers curled over themselves the way a falcon's talons curl around its prey. The anger and rejection were as present as ever. He had been a fool to think himself capable of helping Amelie when he could not even quell the murderous rage in his own soul. _This is my own prison_ , Erik told himself. _I am damned here._

A gentle knock on his door tore Erik from his thoughts. Rising from his coffin, a corpse from the grave, he moved towards the door to greet Amelie. A small cough forced itself from his lungs as his heart's rhythm failed for a split moment. He did not know what he would find on the other end of the door.

"Monsieur, before you speak," Amelie began. Her small, square face held a deep-set frown but her eyes seemed confused; determined but confused nonetheless. "I must say I am in no way ready to accept your offering as an apology. But I would like to thank you for returning my belongings to me."

"It seemed appropriate. Christine's gowns do not suit you. For a woman who so dearly values her dignity, we could not continue to have you wear something that has you, for lack of better terms, bursting at the seams," His mind recoiled at the sarcastic tone in his own voice. Even now, Erik could not bring himself to speak with any kind of unblemished words. But this was a start, at least, and only the monster in him could blame her for not forgiving all his horrid words and misdeeds after only one small act of contrition.

"Th-thank you," Erik tried to stifle a smile as she stuttered onwards. _Bold and yet as cautious as ever_ , he thought to himself. "I must also, _again_ , bring it to Monsieur's attention that we have no food. I am hungry. Feste cried all through the night, didn't you hear him? We must find a way to attain provisions."

"We've already found a way to attain provisions," Erik corrected sternly. He turned away from her and went to his desk. It had taken almost all of two hours, and a vicious brawl with his own ego, to turn one of his glorious, silken black capes into something that could resemble a leper's ragged, dirtied cloak, and he had torn more black cloth to create a wrap to cover the lower portion of his face. He would pull a hood over his forehead and gruesome hair line, leaving only a slit for his eyes exposed. In a way, it reminded him of the coy fabric draped across the khanum's face in Persia. _Both hide something horribly wretched and ugly_ , Erik thought to himself with grim amusement.

He turned to face Amelie whose eyes widened with instant realization.

"And I have a bell here," He confirmed her unspoken revelation as he grabbed a small bronze bell from his desk and rang it for show. "I see no other way around our dilemma save this disguise."

Again, the caterpillar thick brows furrowed.

"And shall we go out today, then?" she asked suspiciously.

"As soon as you are changed, Amelie… if you please."

Finally, to Erik's enormous relief and contentment, she smiled. Her bottom teeth were crooked, but mostly disguised by her plump bottom lip, but with her lopsided smile and dimpled square jaw Erik found it, as usual, quite endearing. Without words, Amelie turned back to her room and closed the door in order to, he presumed, change into one of her own more comfortable frocks.

Erik, the Phantom of the Opera, the Opera Ghost, would at last leave his underground home by the lake, his sole refuge in a world that had so abhorrently tormented him, in order to obtain... groceries. A lump grew in his throat. How long had it been since he had walked the roads of men during the day? How long would it take his eyes to adjust to the harsh, scarring rays of the sun? Erik's pulse began to pump with perilous rage, ringing through his mind and burning beneath his skin. The memories of humans with suspicious, threatening faces on the streets haunted him. He remembered the faces of men in the quarries; the distress of the horrid wretches that paid to see him in his gypsy cage; the fear in the eyes of the rich and well-adorned members of the Persian court… all of it swam in his mind with dangerous freedom, completely beyond his control. The room was spinning, the breath caught in his lungs, the lump in his throat choking him, his pulse, curses! The very blood in his veins tried desperately to betray him. His fists relaxed just long enough to grasp the desk before him with a claw-like grip.

Sheer proximity to the human race distressed him.

 _The Devil's Child, emerged from the bowels of hell once more_. Erik's strength began to return to him as his anxiety was replaced by a defensive agitation. As Amelie returned to his company once more, his temper compelled him to say,

"Should this fail, I will not take responsibility for any horror that my befall you."

Her face remained stony and expressionless before this newest threat.

"You will be blindfolded as we ascend from these tunnels," he explained in a desperate attempt to distract from the ominous words he had uttered. "To prevent escape. Though I've agreed to play along in your little game, do not think me dull, mademoiselle. You are still bound to me."

"Of course, Monsieur," Amelie said with a nod. "Until you release me from your service, I shall stay. Though before we venture into town, I must ask for my wages. I have not yet been paid."

Erik's temper flared. The little money-grubber! Had it not been enough that-

"A governess is always paid wages, in addition to living as a member of the household," Amelie said, interrupting his thoughts. He glared through his mask.

"And how much then, do I owe you," Erik relented.

"Sir my typical salary is 75 francs."

"Per week?"

"No, Monsieur, per month."

"And I thought you had told me you had no tale of woe," He quipped. He handed her a small satchel heavy with the weight of coins. "Take this."

"Please, Monsieur, I cannot," Her cheeks flushed crimson and the embarrassment spread to Erik vicariously, causing his own skin to grow hot in a fashion wholly unfamiliar. "This is too much."

"Then you shall owe me."

"No, Monsieur, I must refuse."

"Then take it for now, to acquire what we shall need, and spend what you like on yourself. Now here, the blindfold." As Amelie took the satchel, Erik stood behind her and tied a thick, velvet blindfold around her face. His hands tangled in her frizzy, ashy brown mane and he felt the delicate scent of gardenias fill his senses. He recoiled as he recognized the scent of Christine's perfume. The memories, her face and her voice, burned in his mind. But this was not Christine.

Erik grasped Amelie's small hand with his long, gloved grip and he noticed her body tense. Of course she would recoil. Everyone did.

"Now come, I'll lead you."


	9. The Meeting

**A/N: Hi everyone! Apologies for the delay in getting this up and posted. I'm trying really hard to make sure continuity flows well, but my mind has been all over the place lately, making it really hard to focus. Lots going on. Anyway, I have through Chapter 14 written, so as editing continues, look forward to more frequent updates from here onwards!**

 **Special thanks to everyone who has reviewed. Please keep 'em coming. It is so helpful to have your insight!**

 **It's a shorter chapter, but I hope you enjoy it nonetheless :)**

 **Thanks!**

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Chapter 9: The Meeting

The streets of Paris were not warm or beckoning on this day. It was typical of early early March; frosty, crisp cold with the lightest dust of pristine white snow and frost struggling to cover the mud and filth of the well-trodden, busy streets; an endless mass of thick, dark, hazy gray clouds spread so thick across the sky that only a faint light from the sun managed to filter through. The black smog of a rapidly industrialized city lingered in stifling layers through the air of the streets and seemed to permeate and soak every brick and every breath of Paris. But Amelie felt the small, budding warmth inside that came with her reunification with the outside world.

The poisonous fumes in the air and the limited sunlight were still a refreshing chage from the putrid gloom of the underground tunnels. Yet in a strange turn of events, Amelie found herself missing the relative warmth of the house by the lake. Though cold, the temperatures remained incredibly consistent, seemingly unaffected by the moody shifts of the weather above ground. Despite this, however, Amelie felt overcome by the sheer ecstasy of seeing the dirty streets, the heavily-cloaked and unapproachable Parisians, and the cold facade of stony shops. But in the background of all of this, the Phantom still lingered behind her, ringing his bell in reminder that Amelie was not alone.

 _C'est la vie!_ This was the life she had chosen and realizing that this trip to the outside world was only the first of many, Amelie felt renewed confidence and strength in her decision to sacrifice the outside world in favor of solitude. _I could have just joined a convent_ , Amelie smiled to herself as she adjusted a small grocery basket in the crook of her arm. _But this is far more interesting._ A Gothic adventure of her own.

At this point, after weeks of living in the bowels of the Garnier Opera House, Amelie had come to think of herself as residing with two men rather than one. There was Monsieur, the quiet, brooding, artistic, and not-altogether-awful man behind the mask, then there was _the Phantom_. It made it easy to excuse the malice and violence of the Phantom when she had the company of Monsieur. The Phantom had berated her when she ask that he don a disguise so that they could travel the streets unnoticed but Monsieur had realized her proposition was the only logical solution. Monsieur had tried to atone for the Phantom's wretchedness by swimming across the murderously cold lake to fetch Amelie's belongings. And thank goodness! It felt wonderful to finally wear a dress that suited her figure as opposed to the prima donna's smaller frame.

Amelie turned into a small grocer's store only a corner away from the Opera House, grateful for it's convenient location. Despite reveling in her freedom, she still felt nervous about the Phantom's disguise. Should someone recognize him it would surely be a disaster for them both, one that she dared not think about for she could not contemplate even a single solution. The Phantom had made it clear that Amelie should suffer the brunt of those consequences, but beyond that also she realized that the little security she had established would be taken from her. She would be forced back into the outside world that had stripped her of choice and opportunity. _If only I could have made it to Prussia_.

Monsieur was older than Amelie. Though she could not tell exactly how much, she knew from her intimate view of his paper-thin skin that it held small wrinkles denoting time, experience, and the habitual expression of emotions on his face. She did not enjoy thinking of him passing, of him meeting his final days in the underground home that would so swiftly become his underground tomb, but she knew the day was inevitable. And on that day, she would be free by age and time to take her wages and finally escape Paris for the philosophically forward-thinking cities of Germany. Perhaps she would find her family. Perhaps not. She did not feel the paralyzing need for familial support that she had sought before her time with Monsieur.

Returning to the task at hand, Amelie quickly found simple foods that she could prepare for herself, Feste, and Monsieur. Because he ate so little, she knew Monsieur's stomach to be sensitive; he could not eat anything with substantial amounts of heavy cream or spices, which suited her more bland tastes just fine. Instead she opted for a variety of sharp cheeses, selecting a more expensive Dutch gouda over local french brie, and a light goat's cheese over the heavy camembert. She eagerly selected apricots, apples, and pears, imagining with watering mouth the delectable fruit and cheese plate she could assemble that same afternoon.

 _Ting, ting._

His bell reminded her that time was of the essence. Amelie quickly selected two loaves of bread and one fresh baguette for the afternoon's meal, a small variety of teas, and a small container of milk before rustling through the heavy bag of coins Monsieur had given to her and leaving the shop with a full basket and an eager grin. She made brief eye contact with the Phantom's exposed golden, suspicious eyes before turning back in the direction of the Opera House.

"Mademoiselle Comtois, Amelie!" Amelie turned over her shoulder to glance at The Phantom again, who she expected to have spoken the words but clearly had not. Then her eyes fell on the young man bounding towards her, just behind where The Phantom stood hunched over and hidden. "You're alive? You're well?"

"Monsieur Moreau," Amelie said politely. As he approached her, she could still see the Phantom, menacing but sulking, still ringing his bell. Her pulse quickened.

"Monsieur? Such formalities between friends, Amelie? Don't be ridiculous."

"Theo, it's good to see you," She smiled weakly.

"Good to see me?" Theo brushed curly, sand-colored locks away from his blue eyes and drew heavy breaths as he came to stand before her. "I thought you dead, no one has seen you…" He began kissing the top of her hand profusely.

"Please, Theo, my hands are quite full," She replied, clutching her arm and basket tightly to her body.

"Then let me help! You're thin, quite pale. And your eyes look sad. You are depressed? Where have you been?"

"So many questions. Please, I have business to attend to."

"Which family are you with now? I should like to come call on you." He remained oblivious to her protests. In any other situation, Amelie would have been warmed by his attentiveness and friendship. Despite their awkward meeting in Soucia, she still welcomed the company of a familiar friend. But as things were now, her heart thumped loudly in her ears, deafening any thoughts that she might have had otherwise.

 _Ting, ting._

"I'm afraid that's simply not possible, Theo," Amelie replied. Lying was not in her nature but she knew she had to come up with something quickly. "My new employer is quite ill. He will have no visitors and his care requires all of my energy."

"His care? Quite ill?" Theo's brow deepened. "Amelie, it's not suitable work, then. He should find an infirmary or a hospice maid."

"What is suitable or not is of no interest to me," she said curtly. "I elected to assist him of my own free will."

"Then, please, at the least let me come visit you. Ill he may be, should he know my intentions, I am sure he would not keep us apart."

"Your intentions?" Amelie stared at him wide-eyed. _Not this again!,_ She thought incredulously. _Not here, not now! Blast!_

 _Ting, ting._

"Don't be coy, mademoiselle," Theo said with a brief, uncomfortable chuckle. "I should still like to marry you, as we discussed in Soucia. Perhaps now that we are back in the city, away from the pressures of family, we could discuss the possibility again. I've my heart set on you, you know."

"I've not decided the same," Amelie's anxiety was instantly replaced by irritation.

"But, _mon cher_ , I thought with no other prospects and us being such good friends… surely you must know I have always cared for you."

"Yet you seem not to care enough to respect my own wishes. I do not desire marriage, Theo, not now. Perhaps not ever. I thought I made that clear in Soucia. "

"I… I don't know what to say," Theo replied slowly in injured tones. "Please, let me make amends. We can start from the beginning. I know you have your own plans, that's what you said, but I want, I _need,_ and will be part of those plans. We'll read plays together and picnic like we used to. I'll make a proper courtship."

"I haven't time for this, Theo," Amelie said glanced over Theo's shoulder to make eye contact with the Phantom again, but she instantly wished she hadn't. The venom in his stare was unmistakable and her blood turned to ice in her veins.

 _Ting, ting._

"Amelie I don't understand why you're behaving this way," His tone grew irritated. "I'm a decent man, I was your childhood friend, we are _supposed_ to marry, and raise children, and move back to the country to grow old. Why don't you want this? It's a perfectly reasonable, nay, _desireable!_ proposition."

"If you haven't heard what I've said, then I don't care to explain myself. Good day, monsieur," She turned away from Theo but he grabbed her wrist with a vicious strength. The breath stuck in her lungs and a cold wind hit with pins and needles against her skin and she gasped, gaping at where Theo's hand held her arm so menacingly.

"No, you'll not simply walk away from me again, Amelie," Theo threatened.

 _Ting, ting._

The Phantom and his bell moved to a spot immediately behind Theo, and a rag-gloved hand reached out and grabbed Theo's resting arm.

"Alms for a poor wretch, monsieur?" Amelie couldn't recognize the harsh, sawtooth tones of the Phantom's voice; gone was the divinely threatening voice she recognized. He had adopted an entirely different persona, had come to life with his seemingly magical ability to create sounds unearthly with his own voice.

Theo turned towards the Phantom with disgust, a reaction Amelie saw and noted to her own disdain. The Phantom's cold gold eyes glared at her and she realized he had intended to make a distraction for her. While Theo was distracted with trying to kick off the old leper and curse him, as Amelie noted with horror his repulsive treatment of a sickly human being, she turned on her heels and made swiftly for the alley leading to the entrance to the fifth cellar of the Opera House.

Her day in the sun had gone nothing as planned and there was no escaping the cold, stifling grasp of horror brought by the streets of men.


	10. The Song

**A/N: Thanks for reviews and such; as promised, I bring you a significantly longer chapter here. It was difficult to write, so feedback is** _ **especially**_ **appreciated here.**

 **Thanks and happy (if you can) reading!**

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Chapter 10: The Song

When at last they reached the grate of the Opera House and crawled inside, Erik noticed Amelie's body shaking slowly and heavily, betraying her distress and the small, desperate gasping breaths at once conveying and exaggerating her panic.

" _Not here_ ," Erik hissed, grabbing her arm and leading her towards the first tunnel. "They'll hear you."

"I have had enough of being man-handled today, Monsieur," Amelie exclaimed as she tore from his grip. Erik turned to face her and pity tugged at his heart as he saw her usually stoic hazel eyes frantic with distress. The madness was written so obviously across her features that Erik knew he looked upon her genuinely now, without the mask of a governess. Though her eyes seemed pristine as they glistened and shone with imminent tears, her porcelain skin was splotched red from the cold winter air. Her hair lay in a russet, frizzy mess with tendrils reaching down across her forehead and down to her chin and her teeth bit down viciously on her bottom lip in a show of her desperate struggle. But the sight of this poor pitiful creature did not outweigh Erik's savage rage or the blistering wound of betrayal. In fact, it only served to frustrate him more and Erik felt himself growing more and more bitter by the moment. Amelie had lied to him.

"And I have had enough of your theatrics," He snapped. As they turned the corner to his first trap door, he turned her forcefully and began knotting the blindfold across her eyes. She spun and stood like a rag doll under his force, still shaking and now sobbing to herself. Erik snatched up the overflowing basket of breads and fruits and grabbed her hand ruthlessly.

"Please monsieur, loosen your grip, it's hurting me," She cried through her tears.

How had he found himself here again? She struggled and fell behind him just as Christine had when she had scorned him with the secret of her lover. Amelie's whimpers and cries echoed in the stairs and tunnels as he yanked her arm to drag her with him. _Down that path into darkness deep as hell._

Each step served to fuel his fiery rage until finally they came to the house on the lake. He angrily smashed the basket onto the ledge and turned to rip the blindfold from her face, taking strands of her hair with it. Amelie cried in pain and grasped her hands to her face. Oh how she resembled Christine now. She looked upon him with horror and fear, sobbing as she resigned herself to her fate with him. A monster.

"And now do you finally feel damned, mademoiselle?" He spat. "Do you finally see what it is you have chosen? You will never have your beautiful lover, not as long as you are cursed here with me!"

"Please, monsieur, I do not understand. I have returned to you by my own free will. Did I not cast off the suitor?" The soft, bottom lip he had admired before still quaked as Amelie desperately tried to fight the tears and regain her composure, but Erik could still observe her turmoil and saw her agony. She refused to move from the ledge by the lake, so Erik violently resolved that, if she would not walk, he would carry her like a parent carries a petulant, screaming child. With a vicious growl he snatched her up, surprised by the weightlessness of her body.

"How could she have spent the weeks with him and allowed him to believe that she had intended to stay?..." Erik growled and rumbled, unable to slow the thoughts and the maddening, swelling pressure in his skull and his chest. Who was he talking to? What was he trying to say? It all felt so utterly disjointed, deranged, unhinged… He only knew he could not contain, could not control, the fractious creature that had awakened and broken from its chains within him. "She had never tried to escape and now he understands why; she was patient and biding her time until her handsome suitor would lead the mob down to The Phantom's sanctuary in the shadows!"

Had it been the first time, Erik would have expected to feel tears of rejection and loneliness filling his eyes and streaming down his face. Unfortunately for the crying, hissing, spitting creature he held tightly, those tears and whatever compassion he could have shed for her had been spent; Christine had made sure of that when she left her Angel in Hell.

"Monsieur, _put me down_! _I demand it_! _I am not a servant to be manhandled!_ " She shrieked. Amelie's cries echoed through the underground and Erik felt them worm their way into his mind to make their home. He dropped her flailing body to the ground in the sitting room and she darted quickly to the corner most opposite him. His first move was towards the desk to replace the cloak that covered his face with the porcelain mask to which they were both most accustomed. As he turned to face her, she spat the most venomous words, "You're behaving like a _monster_!"

"Like a monster! A monster! The Devil's Child, of course he is a monster, you idiot child, you foolish, insolent girl! _I am a monster_!" Erik's mind raced with the darkest emotions, anger, hate, betrayal, and a lust for destruction and punishment. In his mind, he could feel a layer of heavy, thick grime on his hands. The blood of his previous victims soaked and seeped from his pores like the sweat that dampened his brow.

Had Erik's hand found his lasso, the following actions may not have occurred, but instead of strangling the life from Amelie's gentle neck, he found himself viciously storming towards her. Before she could protest, he thrust his mangled lips against hers and grasped her face, forcing her into a hateful kiss. She screamed into his mouth and smashed her fists against him wildly until he released her from his vice grip and assault.

They stared at each other for a moment. Erik huffed furiously. What had the Phantom done this time? _Nothing she hadn't deserved, the deceitful wench. She will not betray me again. She will learn._ Malicious pride filled his soul as he saw the hurt on her face and knew he had perfectly enacted his punishment. It had always been his greatest gift, knowing how best to destroy another human being. But the fear and hatred in her eyes simultaneously shredded like claws at his already torn spirit. And yet, Amelie did not run. He watched her shoulders tense and her jaw set as she resigned herself to whatever he had in store. If he were to attack her again, she would fight him and face the destruction with dignity as if she were Joan of Arc prepared for her martyrdom.

Amelie's eyes held Erik's in a furious stare of contempt, loathing, and pain, hemorrhaging emotions from her body until it became clear that Erik would not, or seemingly could not, bring himself to harm her again. Then, she turned from him and ran towards Christine's room. Erik heard her smash on the door in frustration with what he assumed was her inability to the lock the door from the inside. No matter, if she wanted it locked he would oblige. Let her never forget that she remained his prisoner.

 _Your chains are still mine. You belong to me._

Erik moved to the organ and violently slammed a melody from its keys that he had not played in what seemed like a lifetime.

 _Don Juan triumphs once again!_

The dissonance filled him, at once encouraging and stifling his bottomless rage. So the wretch had not run from him and had not betrayed his secret lair or their arrangement; she did not desperately scream for help or summon the police; and she did not steal his money and leave, as he had considered she would. But she had done something worse. The girl had made it clear that she had no reason to stay with Erik. Indeed, she had a proposal, she already had one foot out the door waiting for her beautiful white gown and a gold band. The woman who had been so adamant about avoiding a proposal stood there in front of a beautiful boy truly smitten with her and received an offering of marriage; of course she could not possibly want to deny the boy for long. No, it was Erik she planned to leave and Erik she planned to betray. But the Phantom had shown her what happened to those who break faith with Erik!

He continued to smash his bony fingers against the keys of the organ, while his heart beat so quickly that he thought perhaps his old, tired body would finally give way, until the joints began to ache, begging for reprieve.

His hands shook less.

His breathing slowed.

He blinked and felt hot tears in his own eyes.

Erik knew he had done wrong. As Amelie said herself, _she chose him_ , for whatever it was worth. She left that Monsieur Moreau in the street baffled by her rejection. It was something Christine had never managed to do and the soprano even wore Erik's wedding band until the day she thought him dead. Christine could show her dedication through empty symbolism, but could not reciprocate in any meaningful action.

"Damn her," He bitterly cursed under his breath. He sat at the organ, shoulders slumped and tired from the exertion required by wrath. "Damn you."

Erik had spent enough time agonizingly pouring over his every loss, every hurt, every betrayal, to see his own role in such events. He often antagonized those he loved and, after a lifetime of this, easily attributed it to his own fear of rejection. And in the face of rejection, both real and perceived, his wrath always escalated beyond that of any reasonable person. Now, with even a fraction of clarity, Erik praised whatever piece of him had stayed his hand from his lasso.

Though he considered, it may have been better if he had killed her. For now, he would eventually have to face Amelie and acknowledge what happened. Blast! How could he avoid her now? How could he face his one friend when she now believed him capable of that most horrendous form of assault: rape.

If only he could show her his true heart!, he lamented. Erik knew himself capable of wretched depravity; he could torture, kill, deceive, even drive victims to madness. But he was not could not complete such a vile act as rape. He could not violate another person in such a way. What forbade him from this evil in particular? He did not know. Empathy was the most pleasant rationale; and certainly it was not incorrect. He had always held a particularly bitter hatred for those who abused the weaker sex only to satiate their own ego. After his time in Persia, he truly sympathized with the plight of women, who had no status save that which was doled out to them by birth or marriage. Yes, empathy was the most pleasant rationale, but Erik knew he would be lying if he didn't partially attribute this sudden moral dilemma to the fact that he had never known the touch of a woman. Rape could not be his first act, nor any one subsequent.

Of course there were the prostitutes with which Madame Giry had tried to satiate him. But he could not bring himself to touch them. Erik was disgusted by their vapid personalities, their lack of patience, and the way they refused to treat themselves or him as a feeling, sentient person. They had reduced themselves and him to sexual vessels, if only as a means to complete the act itself, and it enraged him. Worse than that, how could he have let the go after they had been so unceremoniously, with no precautions, placed in proximity to the Opera Ghost? Everyone thought him dead; how could he release a creature who he suspected would sell their integrity, certainly any information, with the knowledge of him and his home? He could not expel the energy to track them and maintain their silence; Erik had grown old and while the young man in him could have done so, the half-century-old Erik could not. And so the lasso strangled them, and in their last moments both he and they felt human in the most terrible of ways.

Erik did not like to dwell on those or any of his killings for that matter. In fact, throughout all of his life he had desired most to forget the darkness of his soul in pursuit of whatever light remained inside him… if any. It was why he had loved Christine so. She was tragically sad, and their sorrow matched, but she was so pure. She had yet to know malice, greed, or the touch of a man, and the poor creature demanded protection. She was a devout Catholic and only came to her Angel of Music because she believed him a heaven-sent immaculate gift from her deceased father. During those moments of worship with her, Erik truly felt himself an angel. She saw the goodness in him, at least until his loathsome disfigurement tarnished their love.

 _It's in your soul that the true distortion lies…_

Christine's beautiful, pitiful words filled his ears now with certain and perfect clarity. If he had not understood them then, he fully understood them now.

Erik grew sick and was sure he would wretch the contents of his stomach. He ran to the surface of the lake and tore his mask off, screaming his anger and sorrow into the distance. Looking back at him was his own face, his death's head. His cries of agony and hate echoed through his prison.

Then he heard it: The tiniest song of hope, a gentle sonatina that called to him, beckoning him away from the ledge of self-destruction, in Feste's voice.

Feste soared from the darkness to settle near the basket of groceries Amelie had acquired and hopped curiously, with turned head and small, dark, and inquisitive eyes, clearly seeking his daily rations. Wiping the tears he had not realized he had shed away from his face, Erik pulled himself up and over to the basket of foods he had left near the base of the ledge by the lake. He hadn't even taken the time to marvel at what Amelie had so carefully procured during their damnable trip to the outside world. Briefly he had mentioned to her that he did not enjoy eating. So instead of gathering flour and oils and ingredients for cooking complicated pies and pastries or the heavy sauces and creams as he had seen in the kitchens of the Opera House, she instead carefully curated fruits and cheeses, simple deli meats and breads, and a small collection of vegetables. She used foliage greens and carrots as a bed in the basket of her other goods and, tucked neatly in the peripheral, he saw teas of all varieties. He imagined her smiling her lopsided smile proudly to herself as she picked each one, thinking of leaving it at his door and surprising him with the varieties of herbal scents and sensations. Erik felt strangely sad that he had rushed her with the ominous and irritated rings from his bell.

Erik tried to push from his mind how horribly he had ruined that small joy for her and what an evil monster he thought himself, and took a portion of the wheat bread and tore it into small pieces. The gray songbird chirped at him and flittered around expectantly. Still whimpering from his tears, Erik managed a feeble smile. How had the bird managed to survive the darkness? Surely such creatures could not survive without sunlight. Amelie had done her best to nurture him and perhaps this was the sole reason for his survival; she would speak to him and feed him whenever she could. Though despite all her calls to Feste and all her care, the bird instead came to Erik's most pathetic of calls, his tears! What a strange creature!

But as he sat gingerly tearing pieces of bread and feeding them to Feste on the small plate Amelie left out daily, the bird's song began to devour his very being. He heard it all at once; the gentle, middle register calls of a clarinet with the brassy sweetness of a bird's call. A flute would have been too gentle and an oboe too reedy. No, this filled him with clarinet and a heavy call-and-response with cellos. The tender, dulcet tones of Feste's song filled his head with the notes that he knew corresponded to Amelie's words in _Song of the Ephemeron_.

 _Something so divine_

 _Cannot stand the tests of time_

 _I will hold your soul_

 _For as long as you'll be mine_.

Feste continued to sing and Erik ran to the desk to scribble down the music before it threatened to ruin him completely. The warm fifths were tainted by the occasional dissonant falls and Erik felt himself travelling through Amelie's words, a vision of Poe's worship, adoration, and cynicism. Into these notes, Erik poured every memory of beauty; his mother's youthful features, the majesty of Rome, the serenity of Luciana's beautiful features, the wonders of Persia, and even what he could muster of Christine's voice. These sounds would overtake all of him, Erik knew, as he felt the music coursing through and consuming his body. There were no thoughts; none of Amelie, of her suitor, of Erik's horrible revenge; just the music, soothing, enticing, elegant, switching from clarinet to oboe to viola to cello in the strangest of voicings he could muster but with the smoothest of notations, not a staccato in sight.

In red ink, messy and almost illegibly, Erik scribbled as much of the melody and the warm, luscious undertones as he could. Once he finished the root of the melody and the accompanying chords, he began arranging voicings, call-and-response, with two perfectly timed Codas reminiscent of the mysterious and fleeting beauty he embodied with those sounds. He worked well into the night with Feste perched nearby for company. There was no time, only music and the faintest of hopes, and then there was darkness as Erik finally, at last, found sleep.


	11. The Introduction, Part II

**A/N: Another difficult chapter to write. Erik isn't great at apologies, and neither am I.**

 **I've seen a HUGE uptick in views and I'm so grateful you are all taking the time to read!**

 **Thanks!**

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Chapter 11: The Introduction, Part II

Her lips burned. Her tears scalded. Her body shook with anger and terror and paralyzing shock. So much had happened when they left the Opera House and Amelie had scarce time to process or react. And then he _kissed_ her. The thought repulsed her. The Phantom knew what such an act would mean to her, and yet in a show of force and domination he forced his lips upon her own. Her stomach spasmed and threatened her at the very thought.

And his words! The ravings of a mad man! How could he see through such distorted eyes? " _Do you finally feel damned, mademoiselle_?" The question assaulted her with its hatred and malice. The Phantom spoke as if he were no longer himself and had instead assumed the perspective of a silent onlooker, one who would merely narrate events as opposed to partake in them. Now it was clear, though, that the Phantom truly loathed and despised her; if she didn't think herself cursed and forsaken, he had made it clear that he wanted her to feel as much.

Why wouldn't he just kill her? _Because that would not be torture enough_ , she told herself bitterly. He wanted her as a plaything to torment, the way a child tears wings off of a butterfly and watches it squirm. The Phantom loathed her and needed her to know that she was powerless and alone and condemned.

Then there was the matter of Theo; what sick twist of fates had brought these two opposing forces together so serendipitously? Amelie was glad to see him in one respect; she had missed the company of more affable, good-natured people as opposed to the nearly silent co-existence she shared with Monsieur. Yet the arrogance with which Theo spoke to her, as if he had claimed her like a prize horse, revolted her. Amelie was not a poor pet to be taken in with pity and kindness! She was her own person and the master of her own soul. Certainly not a woman to have things such as her marriage decided for her. Theo seemed unwilling or unable to understand, so she had no tears to shed over his wasted proposal.

But Amelie shed tears now. They seemed endless, as if she would drown in them if she could not contain herself and stay afloat. Only hours ago, she felt the wondrous feeling of Paris's cool air against her cheek, the company of other people, and sweet reunification with a city, still so full of life, for the first time in so long. It had been the most joyous occasion and she had even managed to pull Monsieur from his solitude for the briefest of times. And, before that, he had shown such kindness in his apology! Surely if such displays came from any other human being they would have seemed childish and insufficient, but Amelie recognized his apology as an unusual and promising behavior and she accepted it as best she could. Her chest heaved as the breath stuck in her lungs at the thought of him retrieving her belongings from across the lake; such a simple gesture. She had thought him not as a prison-keeper but as just a misguided soul who had faced so much solitude as to lose his ability to express himself appropriately. Unfortunately for her that was not the case, and she reminded herself she could never fall prey to such thinking again. It was dangerous.

For the first time, she felt like a prisoner. The Phantom had made his intentions clear and Amelie curled up in her bed as small as possible, shielding herself from whatever would come next.

Later, from the darkness of the caves and her sleep-riddled mind, Amelie heard the call like the voice of salvation. It could have been Saint Peter at the gates of Heaven; the sound was so clear, beautiful, pure, and inviting.

Amelie knew she could not resist the song of Feste, even if it meant facing the Phantom in all his horror. Since her arrival the governess had endured, even in her optimism and fortitude, the deep silence of the caverns alone. Only the idea of Feste and his far off song had soothed her anxieties and growing madness when the silence paralyzed. He had been her entire hope. And, rationally, she needed to find him now in the most desperate of times.

"Feste, is that you?" She ran past the Phantom who lay sleeping with long limbs sprawled across the desk in the sitting room. At first, Amelie could not find Feste, until she turned behind her to see the songbird sitting above the Phantom's ahead on a shelf where he had placed a small plate of bread crumbs. Amelie huffed indignantly; of course, Feste befriended the sleeping Phantom before her. What an insult! It was she who had fed him and cared for him these long weeks and yet instead Feste flew and sang towards her tormentor! Her attacker!

But when Amelie saw him, her wonderful, grateful songbird whom she had sustained for all these weeks in the darkness, she could hardly bring herself to hold a grudge. He was so beautiful with his satin gray feathers and a small black tuft settled on his head like a cap. But as soon she approached Feste, happily gulping away at the small morsels of bread Monsieur had left for him, the gentle creature stopped, jerked his head to one side, and fled from her.

Amelie felt herself crumble, utterly defeated. Why? Why did Feste come to the Phantom's raging sorrows when the man had _never_ fed him, never cared for him? Indeed, it was the Phantom who left him wandering in the darkness! And yet still, Feste came to his cries and appeared when the Phantom needed him, but ran from Amelie.

"Feste? Feste! Why?" She cried into the darkness. Feste gave no answers, only sang his song into the darkness as he disappeared once again. Amelie's fingernails dug vicious, painful cuts into her palms and blood began oozing and exploring slowly through the small, fine lines of her hands. She did not even feel the pain, not when the tears and loneliness blinded her completely.

" _Do not harm yourself, child_ ," A soft, smooth song coaxed from behind her in beautiful and soothing lullaby. It tempted her and sedated her, but Amelie shook her head to break from the entrancing words. Oh, but it was still the sweetest sound she had ever heard, so sorrowful but so tender! "I have damaged you enough, please do not inflict any more harm upon yourself."

Amelie knew it could only be the mesmerizing song of the Opera Ghost. But she was not the sad prima donna! She wouldn't fall prey to a magician's tricks! Amelie left the living room of the house, ran past the ledge by the lake, and threw herself into the frigid water, fighting the spell as best she could. But the Ghost's sweet words seemed to have wormed their way into her mind. They were so inviting! She wanted desperately to give in to the voice's every whim.

"Leave me be, you horrible snake!" Amelie hissed as the cold soaked her frock and permeated her veins. The acid memory of his kiss burned on her lips anew. Her slightly bloodied hand brushed her lips instinctively and she could feel a light smear of blood linger in her mouth.

"You must forgive me," Monsieur begged softly with an unfamiliar humility. "I am despicable... I would be a fool to deny this part of my nature… but I can speak to you plainly, with a self-awareness I have only recently gained since Christine…"

"We do not speak of her, Monsieur!" Amelie snapped mockingly. "And I am not your caged prima donna. I came here by my own decision and I shall curse that decision until I die here!"

"But that is just it, Amelie, my dear-"

"How dare you call me that!" She huffed angrily.

"Listen, I come to you more humbly now than ever have I before; as just a man learning his own soul, his own heart," Amelie could almost bring herself to believe him. "I have always known myself capable of such vindictive behavior; I know I have harmed you in such a vile way. I have betrayed the one simple request you made of me."

"I came here, I _chose_ this," Amelie knew her face portrayed the confusion and sureness she felt. Why had she done it? It did not matter because whatever impulsive and spiteful or desperate logic had brought her here it had been her own; but she felt so childish! How could she have imagined this going any differently? She _knew_ him capable of evil, of murder!, and yet she went willingly to the Opera Ghost for what reason? To prove a point? This was the consequence of her actions; now her first kiss belonged to a madman.

"And I betrayed you!" Monsieur lamented. "I became the despicable demon they said I should be. The Phantom is a cursed soul! But for every awful deed bestowed upon him, he has replied with his own wrong in turn."

Amelie felt hot tears well in her eyes.

"But you must- no, pardon me, I _beseech_ you understand...," Monsieur now stood close to her in the cold water, only an arm's length away. It was clear that he struggled to maintain this demeanor of humility and diffidence, that apologies were unfamiliar and unsettling to him. Ghosts do not need to apologize, after all; they aren't bound by the petty laws and niceties of men. Amelie wished she could approach him and seek solace as one does from a friend and companion, but she could not; not when her companion was her villain as well. "The Phantom will not harm you, this I can promise you. Erik would not let him."

Amelie kicked at him, splashing the icy water into his face and he recoiled with a snarl betraying his growing frustration. _Who in the devil's name was Erik?_ The Phantom could not let Erik apologize painlessly, and Amelie wanted nothing more than to antagonize the monster in him as best she could. But the water was so cold and… when had she eaten last? Had it been days now? Her resolve was only strong as her body would allow, and it seemed that she would receive only limited support in these crucial moments.

" _Erik would not let him_?" Amelie composed herself from a slight sway of her body and glowered and glared at him alongside her bitter, facetious question. "I don't _know_ , Erik, Monsieur. I certainly wouldn't trust him after that show yesterday afternoon."

"Ah. Well… Erik is… he would protect you, if you would only let him," Monsieur stared up at her with pleading, threatening, eyes. _Both of them…_

 _He is only a man_.

"I... I don't…" Amelie felt her body and mind rapidly rushing towards exhaustion again, careening towards the edge of a cliff with momentum she could not stop. Images of Theo in the market, of the Phantom's menacing eyes as he kissed her, of her basket of fruits and cheese, of Feste's song… how could one person be expected to manage this?

Finally, the weight of the world was too much to bear and Amelie felt her weak, hungry, tired and tragic body give way. Monsieur reached out hesitantly, so cautiously that it tugged at her soul, but in a last show of anger and defiance, Amelie tore her hands away from him with as much, and it was admittedly little, force as she could muster before saying,

"Do not touch me, Monsieur."

Amelie noticed hot, angry, exhausted tears dripping from her face into the lake and saw the glistening of Monsieur's own drip down from either side of his mouth from under his mask.

"Amelie, mademoiselle," Monsieur admitted softly between the strangest sound Amelie had ever heard. It was a laugh, a sob, a whisper, all at once, an overwhelming plethora of emotions indicating a loss of control in the Monsieur that she could hardly believe. "Erik… my name… it's Erik."

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Oh, sweet Feste! Sweet, beautiful songbird with your simple, undemanding presence, and your beautiful song! Forgiveness and hope! All embodied in that wonderful creature, the poor dove he had cast aside in rage and torment! As Erik's tears fell into the lake he could see Amelie's as well and they joined, no longer each drop of water to its own person but instead shared sorrow and hope joined into the lake beneath the Phantom's Opera. Lines had been blurred irreparably between the governess and the drunken Monsieur, and their nature had been fundamentally changed; in those mercilessly cold waters, Erik felt himself reborn.

Why could he have not found such clarity before he drove Christine away? The timing seemed a trick of sadistic Fate. If it were his Angel's he could have demonstrated such meekness towards, if it were Christine to whom he apologized, perhaps she would have sat, kneeling in the cold water before him instead of Amelie. But then… perhaps he needed to lose Christine to find whatever salvation he bathed in now. Could it even be called salvation? No, he was not saved. But he was living. The horrors of the past were not gone, but they were encompassed; smaller parts of a whole.

"Erik? You are Erik?" Amelie breathed heavily. Erik could see her body sway slightly for the second time and her eyes shone with tears stifled by a haze of exhaustion. Her puffy eyes, scarlet cheeks, and swollen, bitten lips appeared not glamorously beautiful, but real, genuine, flawed, and stunning through his mind's eye in the strangest way. Erik had the opportunity to behold Amelie in her most raw and most basic state of being. Gone was the composed, stern, governess. She did not gaze at the ground in faux or real servitude, her voice was not steady with sureness and composure. She was veritably herself. It was an honesty he had never witnessed before, certainly not with Christine. Why could he not stop thinking of his Angel right now, of all moments?

"But… no…" She looked at him with feverish anxiety, "The kiss, it…."

 _The Phantom, that… monster!_

"A monster indeed," All hope dissipated, she sobbed and Erik realized he had spoken the thought aloud. "You betrayed me. And for what? Because a man fancied me?"

"You said you had no prospects…"

"I _choose_ my prospects," Amelie said firmly. Oh what sweet relief it was to hear her adamant words, not the weak, defensive tremblings of terror! Erik celebrated that he had not broken her. She was not all lost. But in a brief halt between her words, Erik heard her teeth chatter.

"I haven't eaten…" Amelie excused herself. "And it's quite cold… I don't feel well…"

"You're going to catch cold if we stay here. Let me make you tea for a change," Erik offered the way a child offers chores to his mother for the first time, emboldened by the prospect of helping.

"That would be… thank you…" Amelie's figure grew softer, her expression completely innocent, as she fell into the banks of the lake unconscious. Erik couldn't help but compare her to Christine in that way as well… the more fragile and hysterical sex seemed always to be fainting and falling. But even in the midst of this observation, Erik panicked. He could not hold her and lift her from the lake, it would be the very violation she had just sworn off. He could not drag her from the lake by her arms or legs- how undignified and positively shameless! But he also could not leave her. So desperately with gloved hand, he grasped her face. At first, he wanted to retract his touch. For it was not her skin that chilled him, but the complete fondness with which he held her shapely square jaw.

What an odd sensation to hold another person as such. How strange to feel, in spite of the cold, the warmth of her skin against his gloved hand. She seemed so gentle and fragile underneath his touch, so vulnerable. Erik withdrew his hand as if burned by her cheek. Then, the cold water lapped upon her face, causing her to gasp awake.

"Oof! Oh blast," Amelie came to timidly with a subtle, composed shock. "Fire, please… Blast it's so cold, I've never been so cold."

Erik offered his arm as she stood on her own accord, unhurriedly but determined as always. They sloshed through the cold of the lake together, Erik's skeletal figure supporting Amelie's own thin frame almost completely, towards the house, and into the sitting room. He led her to the long, crimson divan and placed one of his black cloaks around her. She suddenly seemed so small, but Amelie seemed to fit in perfect comfort. In that moment, Erik could imagine no one else in her place.

A black tea, that's what he needed! He rummaged through the packets of leaves Amelie had acquired that previous afternoon-god, had so much transpired in such a short time? And had Erik truly slept for an entire night on that desk?- and found the leaves of a black tea. It had been a sign of wealth in the days before the wars and the revolutions and Amelie deserved only the best, things of elegance and excellence and exquisite nature.

As he boiled the water on a gas-range stove of his own design, Erik could feel the creeping heat filling and warming him and he hoped that it would soon fill the small house by the lake. He had never used the stove before, only built it out of curiosity to see how an alternative to the noxious coal burning stoves of the Industrial Revolution could work (it had also given him a dark humor in knowing that the pipes connecting natural gas to the Opera House were in fact powering his own hearth as well.) In fact, the design had been perfect for the underground layer, for it did not require the tedious ventilation demanded by wood and coal burning devices. Thank goodness! He couldn't imagine using the stove for the first time only to drown Amelie in thick, black smog.

In an odd reversal of roles, it was Erik who brought the tray of tea to the governess. As Amelie lay still, chattering and shivering silently, he pulled another chair towards where she lay and placed the tray of tea there.

"Your tea, mademoiselle," He said softly, brushing a few wet strands of hair from her face gently. The gesture felt wildly unnatural and ill-advised, and Erik knew he needed Erik knew this was how humans comforted each other. Quickly he withdrew his touch as Amelie's eyes opened slowly to meet his. The air stuck in his throat and he felt his soul penetrated. "Feste… his song. I've, ah, written it down. I will write it into a magnificent piece, _Song of the Ephemeron_. Let me play it for you."

One corner of her mouth curled upwards in a smaller version of her wonderful, lopsided smile. Erik glowed with his approval and took up his violin for the first time in what felt like decades. As Amelie grew warmed and comforted by the tea, her eyes alternated between watching him carefully and closing softly, betraying her drowsiness. Then she passed silently into sleep.

Erik continued playing. Once he finished his own piece, his fingers continued to move and his arm continued to bow, moving into an Albinoni concerto, as if they could not be stopped. He had truly found his music again.


	12. Death's Theme

**A/N: Thanks for the reviews! This is another shorter chapter, but oh boy are we gearing up for some good stuff ahead. As always, please review and thank you for all your wonderful words of support!**

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Chapter 12: Death's Theme

Erik continued playing until his calloused fingers grew raw and painful, and then he played even more. He could not stop. And endless parade of emotions threatened to burn him away if he could not lead and channel it through song. As he played, the images came rushing like feral waves to his mind; He could see his mother, beautiful, angry and terrified, and could feel her loathing, and terror as she looked upon her son, a creature she knew had fallen to the temptations of Satan. He remembered Sasha and the agony when humans senselessly stole her from him; the heartbreak, the complete loss of love in a world that had denied him even the most basic understanding of such an emotion. Erik could recall the perfect clarity with which he swore off religion when he was told that Sasha, the one creature that had managed to show him love, would not go to heaven; he recalled the murders in Persia and the young harem girl; he heard Christine's voice, untrained, and pure and sad; he saw their love die over and over again the in Opera House as she "played" engagement with her cursed Vicomte. Yet in the midst of all of this, the most wretched experiences were seen through tinted shades of hope and newfound understanding.

So lost was he in his own musical world, that Erik did not see Amelie rise and scurry to her room to hide when she finally woke again. In fact, he didn't note her absence at all until the strings of his violin formed sharp cuts in his fingertips and he finally found himself forced to forgo song temporarily. As soon as his eyes fell upon the abandoned chaise with his cape strewn across it in the most unceremonious fashion, a familiar falling sensation signalled his disappointment; the girl had fled from his presence.

Though Erik could not blame her. Despite his apologies, he was not naive enough to expect that all would be forgiven. As the days passed, however, he realized he had underestimated the extent of Amelie's apoplectic resentment. She would not utter a single word. In fact, she would not even leave her room until she knew Erik had retired to his own. Nightly he would leave the divan by the fire to lay in his coffin and listen to her scurry anxiously to the kitchen, retrieve as little food as possible as if trying to leave the impression that she had not eaten at all, then return to her room. He did not intrude on these daily excursions and they did not speak.

The scared, frightened governess's refusal to acknowledge him angered Erik on more than one occasion. The Opera Ghost had begged forgiveness! It was not just uncharacteristic, but unfathomable, and her subsequent rejection settled a deep, seething anger in his gut. Perhaps Amelie had just been too exhausted to process the wondrous apology and to extend her forgiveness in return. As Erik followed that vein of thought, he considered her ever-thinning frame as it gave way to the cold and the days of starvation preceding their excursion, and the emotional bombardment she had endured from both that repugnant dandy and the Phantom. Regardless of her state, however, Erik also knew he had shown her a vulnerableness that no other human, save Christine, had seen from him. He begged. He cursed the Phantom. He swore _Erik's_ protection and gave her his name! Who was this poor, pathetic creature to deny him salvation?

Erik's rage translated into _Death's Theme_. In _Eleonora_ , Amelie had made it clear that she wanted to emphasize the incurable, infallible presence of Death throughout even the most beautiful parts of the play. Initially, Erik thought Death's music would be a tragic, melancholy chorus that played lightly underneath Feste's melodies in _Song of the Ephemeron_ , or playing softly at the ends of _Mare Tenebrarum_. But now Erik knew, or rather realized once again, that Death's song was angry, frustrated, even hateful. It was wrath! Death did not find its own actions tragic, only natural and victorious over the state of the living, a state which Death would always be denied!

When Erik's hands grew too torn and calloused to play his violin, he turned from the beautiful songs back towards the organ. Dissonant, chaotic chords would fill his mind for hours and days at a time, uninterrupted by the need for food, sleep, or Amelie's company. It drowned out Feste's cries from the tunnels (was Amelie still feeding him, despite her solitude?) as runs of triplets and 32nd notes swam through Erik's ears, from his mind through his hands and onto the red ink stained parchment, swirling, running, flying, underwriting the slow progression of Death's horrid music. It was _Don Juan_ in Death's clothing.

How had he returned to this place so quickly? Only a few days ago, Erik had heard music so beautiful, so loving… he had touched Amelie's broken, tired face with the tenderness he longed for from his own mother. He loved her companionship completely. From the great disaster of his violent temper, Erik had found himself finally able to grasp that which had driven Christine from him. He _finally_ understood an inkling of genuine, humble friendship… but now it was gone, replaced by the furious frustration that Amelie had not accepted his apology completely. And why not? He had _apologized_!

After days of this agonizing torment, Erik lay in his coffin for a few moments of silence to allow his brain to rejuvenate when he heard the soft knock at the door. He leapt silently from his tomb and rushed to the door, composing himself as best he could before opening it to see Amelie's ruined, dark, and tired face staring up at his own.

"I fear I shall never finish the words to our opera," She confessed, clearly consumed by her exhaustion.

"What?" Erik asked incredulously. Amelie had come to speak of their _opera_ instead of their friendship? "Our opera?"

"Yes," Amelie replied, indifferent to his obvious frustration. " _Ephemeron_. I've heard you playing it, playing the song that Feste sings to you. But I cannot write anymore of the words. I've… I've never been in love… I-"

Erik's anger softened as she began to weep. What a state the poor girl was in!

"My dear child…" He said softly. If he had been even remotely capable of the kind of human interaction he longed for, Erik would have taken Amelie into his arms and held her, letting her cry away her exhaustion, anger, sadness, and confusion. But as it were, they simply stood facing each other, an impassable chasm between them, as she wept.

"Could you… I wanted you to…" She took heavy breaths as she tried to calm herself and Erik searched her distressed features for any sign of what she would ask. "Could you tell me of Christine? Of your love for her? They say it was enough to burn the world, that you _worshiped_ her beauty…"

Erik coughed as the air stuck in his lungs. Love enough to burn the world? Certainly. Worshiped her beauty? Quite an understatement. He _lived_ for her beauty, for her innocence, for the wonderful way her eyes would stare at him, glassy and enchanted, unworried and unfettered by what lay behind his mask. That is, until she saw what lay behind the mask. From then on, her adoration was always tinged by fear. She did not manifestly display the same disgust that other humans had, once they beheld his fetid features, but the horror and fear were inescapable. And then there was the matter of the Vicomte… if it weren't for the boy, the boy who so closely resembled Amelie's own suitor, Christine perhaps could have learned to love Erik. She loved his voice and his music, surely if they were to remain undisturbed, Christine could have learned to love Erik as a man as well… but his angel could never see Erik as she saw the Vicomte, as only a man.

"Ah… I… well...," Erik started. He tried to find the words. He wanted to tell Amelie everything, to show her how to write words of love; not the love of children's fairy tales, but the kind of love that consumes and devours everything it touches, for better or for worse. But he couldn't. The words did not come to his mind and he felt ruined in the silence. "I can not."

Amelie's features grew frantic for a moment before resigned.

"Very well, Monsieur…" She looked down in the most pitiful display of defeat before turning from him.

"Amelie, would you like tea?" Erik offered earnestly. He had to do _something_.

"Very well, Monsieur." She replied softly. But she did not move to sit on the divan or in the large reading chair of which she had grown so fond. Instead, she went to her room and closed the door. She wore a different mask now, one that Erik could neither fully understand nor decipher.


	13. The Letter

**A/N: Thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed so far! You all are amazing and I appreciate it so much. The previous chapter was shorter, and I could have expanded a bit on the Phantom and Christine, so I've decided to do a "deleted scene one-shot" to expand on that. Look forward to that once we've finished the story.**

 **This next chapter is longer, I hope you all enjoy!**

* * *

Amelie couldn't fight the fatigue. It consumed all her hours and all her days and her entire mind and body. There was simply no room for anything but the suffocating darkness that loomed within her, dampening and stifling any sort of joy or creativity.

She couldn't forget the kiss; it symbolized an incomprehensible malice emanating from someone she had begun to trust… Erik. It felt so odd to know the name of the man behind the mask, and it lent intimacy to their relationship at a time when it felt unnatural, unprecedented, and more than that, unwanted. Amelie did not want to feel attached to him or even related in anyway. Remorse filled her; she shouldn't have come here. That would have seemed obvious much sooner to any rational person, but Amelie now knew herself not to be the most judicious of people. If she were such, she would have found a new governess position _above_ ground and saved enough money to go to Prussia.

And still the kiss burned her. It seemed ironic to her that such a loving gesture could turn so foul when used incorrectly and for the wrong reasons. A symbol of love, tenderness, and kindness could also be transformed into a violent and offensive weapon wielded only with malice and hatred. Now, her first experience with this action would be one of pain and remorse. It was an action that seemed unforgivable.

How could Amelie even face Monsieur-Erik- now? She tried to bring up Christine, but it had not simply been an innocent gesture seeking inspiration for their opera, as she had claimed. It was her own attempt at cruelty, a strange and ill-suited tactic she had chosen to try and breach the wall between them. She wanted to remind this monster of his most painful memories; of his failures, his losses, and his utter inability to love, and Amelie could tell she had succeeded. Erik found himself incapable of even speaking of Christine; an action, or lack thereof, she had taken to indicate his own painful introspection.

At the same time, though, Amelie truthfully did struggle with writing. Of course she knew the culprit to be her own existential agony and the way overpowering sadness and emptiness consumed her into darkness. The walls and stone seemed colder, the sight of the underground lake brought chills to her body, and she could not warm herself under the robes and blankets that adorned what was meant to be Christine's prison. Instead, it was Amelie's. But the room was nothing compared to the prison of her mind. How could she have been so stupid as to place all of her well-being, her confidence, her sureness on something as easily destroyed as her own feeble, human form? Clearly, such philosophy had been a mistake; one kiss shattered her.

Though try as she may to avoid Erik, content to wallow in solitude and misery rather than face him, Amelie still had to eat. After she confronted him about Christine, Erik began waiting in the sitting room that lay between their sleeping chambers and the kitchen. He never spoke to her, but she could feel his watchful eyes on her as she passed him silently each time. Then, eventually, he spoke.

"The music is developing nicely, thanks to Feste's inspiration," He offered sternly, with an unusual professionalism, as she tried desperately to ignore him. "You must listen to it. I've written Death's theme, _Mare Tenebrarum,_ and music for _Song of the Ephemeron_."

" _Must?_ " The words hung silently between them. Neither Amelie's nor Erik's expressions gave way, both adamant to stand their ground in this small skirmish. Though he held not the malice of the Phantom, Erik's mouth under the mask made it clear that he no longer felt the need to tip-toe around Amelie's still-present injury. After a week of painful coexistence, it was time to stop this game.

"Very well. I'll listen," Amelie said coolly with suspicious eyes.

Erik went to his violin.

" _Mare Tenebrarum_ ," He introduced with a soft, gentle voice that felt as warm and calming as velvet and lavender in Amelie's mind. Curse his angelic words!

The music that he played only exacerbated her exasperation. It seemed cruel that one person should be so gifted! The piece began with slow, single notes painting the picture of a soft melody. Then, building, gentle arpeggios, falling and rising with an ebb and flow that mimicked the gentle grace of an ocean's receding tide; loud waves followed by small, soothing laps against the watery sands that crept upwards, ever upwards, with a gentle caress until then retreated back into the mass of water.

"Then the full strings build from lower octaves, the bass pizzicato…" He narrated but Amelie could hardly imagine the sounds in her mind as Erik undoubtedly could. She tried, but her lack of familiarity composed a piece in her mind that would only be called half-baked at best. She couldn't experience it the way he did but despite her frustration continued with eager ears and a mind inspired that her words could illicit such beautiful tones from Erik's soul. And clearly, this music came from the very core of his being; she stood there, staring, looking inside of him as if his skin and ribs were made of glass and she could see every fiber of his being working in perfect sync.

"A french horn joins over the violin," Erik continued as he played, his voice as sweet and tumultuously inviting as the purest of high notes he bowed from his violin. Then, the arpeggios fell in consecutive rhythm, giving way to an inviting dissonant half-step that made Amelie yearn for the resolution. She felt Erik's song move into an abrupt key change with shorter notes and found herself craving every note. "It should feel unsteady, unpredictable… a reflection of your punctuation."

He raised a humorous visible corner of his mouth, and Amelie couldn't help but smile. It was hardly an insult. She had written in such a way purposefully, and he had noticed!

Then Erik's elegant hand moved higher on the neck of the violin giving way to the highest, sweetest pitch Amelie had ever heard, with one note ringing in a perfect vibrato. It filled her soul completely with an eager, covetous heart and then, again, he found his way to a leading tone, that swelled towards and demanded resolution. With a final hurried, desperate, and consuming arpeggio, Erik's song reached it's pinnacle before finally, to Amelie's sweet, rushing relief, landing on the tonic note.

A silence hung between them, the only sound from their own breaths perfectly in sync.

"It's perfect," Amelie said with a contented sigh. "And I despised every moment of it."

Incertitude and injury flashed from Erik's stare for only the briefest of moments before the gold, glowing eyes returned to their characteristic cold and indifference.

"Ah, I see. Well in that case I-" He flared before Amelie cut him off saying,

"I despised it because it made me so desperately want to forgive you."

Confusion once again made its home in Erik's eyes.

"And because I know I will forgive you," Amelie continued with a heavy sigh. Only now did she realize she held heavy breaths to herself after first truly hearing Erik's music. God, it had been so wonderful! "In time. But for now let it be enough that we may continue to work together on the opera... as cordially as circumstances may allow."

"You must still know how very sorry I am," Erik said softly as he stared down at the ground intently. "There are no more words for it…"

"Then let no more be spoken," Amelie replied. She wanted to comfort him! The sadness in his voice was so palpable that it tugged at every tender instinct within her. But the kiss still lingered in her mind convoluted only by the echos of the song that still lingered within her.

Erik nodded in agreement, and after scavenging from her chosen foods from the market, Amelie once again made her home on the divan across from Erik and before the fire. Finally, they returned to their comfortable silence.

* * *

Only one week later, Amelie and Erik had much to show for their silent servitude to one another. They had completed _Mare Tenebrarum, Death's Song, Eleonora and Death's Duet, Acronistic from Aelous_ (the god of the winds who laments Eleonora's impending death)1, and _Poe's Declaration_. Truly only the homage to the _Valley of Many Colored Grasses_ and _the River of Silence_ lay before them, but they seemed to have reached an impasse. Erik could not write something bright, promising, and jovial enough for _Many Colored Grasses_ and both he and Amelie felt the music and words, respectively, evade them.

Amelie thought she should die, ironically, at her inability to write the River of Silence. She tried writing of waters, brighter, deeper, and more silent than anything of this world, held in a narrow, twisting path bottomed by smooth, light pebbles and stones; as Poe said, "shining on gloriously forever". This was how Poe wrote of the River. But Amelie dreamed of a beautiful river flowing away from her, cold waters running through her fingers, slipping away constantly and endlessly, as Eleonora did from Poe. Poor, poor Poe! But she could not write it! Despite the death of her parents still lingering in her mind, the death of her father, especially, still a small, infected and festering wound, like cuts around cuticles that had once been a bleeding, pussing, painful gouge, the kind of wound that felt constant and inescapable. Though only a few short months ago, it felt like a lifetime.

For Erik's part, Amelie heard him try over and over to compose the lighter, hopeful and lush piece that would become the _Valley of Many Colored Grasses_.

"Blast! These words…. There's no music in these words! How could you expect me to compose when all you've provided me with is nonsense?" Erik snapped one day. He was sitting at his desk and had slammed an irritated fist onto the table in a posturing show of his temper the way an ape pounds its chest to establish its agitated dominance. Amelie had grown past her fear of the Phantom, by this point, and instead of a show of terror sprawling across her features, she simply smiled. She stood next to him, peering over his shoulder to parchment splotched and stained with red ink.

"The words are wonderful, Erik, and you know so. Are you so very troubled that you must place the blame on me? Am I to be responsible for your current inability to compose?"

" _Inability to compose?_ " The incredulousness of his tone and his wide, shocked eyes

shining from behind his mask were too much for Amelie to bear and she laughed with a hearty kindness.

"Please, do stay calm, monsieur. I only meant that-"

"Do not "monsieur" me. You're mocking me," Erik's tone was as dark and ominous as ever, but he sounded childishly baffled, and Amelie could tell her laugh had had some success at keeping his temper at bay.

"Maybe return to your drawing for a while, Erik? The words will still be here when you are ready." Amelie said softly. She almost reached out to rest her tinyhands on his gloved fist but still could not bring herself to touch him. The kiss had not altogether been forgotten.

"It's not about _ready_ ," Erik huffed. "It's about the topic… "many-colored grasses", what sort of inspiration can I extract from that? What sort of pedant topic is-"

"Erik," Amelie coaxed. "Don't compose about _grass_ , the music should speak of beauty and hope and joy; the music should encapsulate all the wondrous optimism of young love."

Erik turned to look up at Amelie and she felt her entire body warm at the sight of his eyes; so boyish and utterly candid in his yearning. Could this be the same man who had killed mercilessly? Who had attacked Amelie? She could not bring herself to believe so.

"I've never written about such things before…" He said softly. Oh, she wanted to weep! How could such a genius be denied the opportunity to write of joy? Again, Amelie found herself sure that no horror behind the mask could be so severe as to deny Erik this most basic understanding. "And Feste… I don't hear this in his song… do you think him very unhappy here?"

"No, Erik," Amelie replied with a gentle smile. "He couldn't be. Not with the amount of attention you drown him in; in fact, I think he's grown quite portly. Perhaps you should spend _less_ time worrying about Feste and more worrying about our opera."

A flash of indignation across Erik's visible features and the moment of tenderness dissipated.

"I spend all day and all night worrying about this opera!"

Amelie could hardly stifle an eye roll as she turned from Erik to retrieve the leather folder that held his drawing parchments. She had never laid eyes on whatever masterpiece he fervently sought to bring to life, but she knew it calmed him and distracted him. He would spend hours by the fire with his charcoal sketching with broad strokes then small, fine chipping motions. Nightly, he almost always threw his work away, left in a pile Amelie had once glimpsed next to the coffin in his chambers. Perhaps she would never know what Erik translated from his mind to paper, but she did not need to. The drawing served its purpose.

"No, not now. Come. Let us find Feste." Erik's long limbs propelled him up from his slumped over position and onto his feet. He towered over Amelie with his skeletal figure and the closeness of their bodies still made her uncomfortable. But with no other reservations, Amelie agreed. They had taken to setting out Feste's meals together. On her part, she did so because she knew Feste more likely to stay if Erik were present, but Erik seemed desperate as ever to find something in the creature, as if twice-daily visits meant that Feste would sing for him. It was a strange and wonderful friendship and Amelie would smile as she thought of the serendipitous nature of the world. Madame Giry had brought the bird, which Erik had despised, but now the very same bird brought him so much amusement.

 _Ting ting ting ting ting._

Amelie's eyes met Erik's concern as this new, unfamiliar stimulus rang through the underground house on the lake.

"It appears we have a guest, my dear," Erik growled as he moved towards the desk where the lasso lay next to the violin.

"Erik wait… you don't need to kill," Amelie said.

"But it could ruin everything… everything we-," Erik's eyes filled with worry as his hands grasped the lasso and searched Amelie's own with an emotion she could not describe, though it caused her heart to beat more quickly than ever. Fear? _Yes. Yes, let's call it_ just _fear._ She told herself adamantly.

"Yes but maybe- Erik!-" It was too late; he had turned away from her. Amelie had to stop him, but she had grown smaller and even more feeble since her time with Erik, likely due to the inactivity. She only tidied, dusted (as Erik seem content to live in proper disarray), and sat to write; nothing that encouraged any sort of physical fortitude. But Amelie also knew when logic would fail to persuade Erik, and this was one of their times. He had always been so protective of their privacy.

"Please, it is only I!" A woman exclaimed from across the lake.

"Madame Giry!" Amelie cried. "Oh Erik! Put down the lasso!"

"Not until I know why-"

"It's a message, for the girl, the governess."

Erik and Amelie eyes found each other in bewilderment. First, Amelie recoiled at the thought of herself as a governess. She had not felt as such since their venture to the outside world; the events succeeding that exploration had certainly blurred the lines between employer and employee indefinitely. She and Erik had progressed beyond that for better or for worse. Then, Amelie realized the meaning of Madame Giry's words. A message meant that someone knew Madame Giry to be associated with Amelie. This put them only steps away from knowledge of her real location... And who was trying to contact her anyway?

As Amelie processed these thoughts, Erik had already made it halfway across the lake in the small row boat, his long, lanky, but muscular, arms and torso propelling the oars with an impressive velocity. As he reached the opposite bank, Amelie could only make out a few hushed words underneath the sound of Feste's cries; he was clearly equally distressed by this new visitor.

Soon, Erik began rowing the boat back across the lake with Madame Giry inside.

"It's from your uncle," Erik said, his words dark with suspicion. "If he knows where you are… but Madame Giry swears he does not… but-"

"Let me read the letter before you grab your lasso and hunt him down in Soucia." Amelie snapped. She had grown so much less stoic and infinitely more confrontational since her time with Erik, but it felt empowering. Before, Amelie thought herself only free if she were untouched and unmarried, but there was something deliciously emancipating about also displaying one's emotions so manifestly. She felt Erik's gold, deciding eyes upon her as she read.

" _Amelie, my dearest,_

 _I am writing to inform you that I have grown gravely ill. Perhaps the wine will finally do me in and end this slow descent into wretched helplessness. As it is, I thought you should like to know that your dear uncle finds himself on death's door. I would like to see you one last time._

 _Wherever you may be, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy, I hope this finds you well, and I hope to see your wonderful, smiling face once more._

 _All my love,_

 _Henri Comtois,"_

Amelie read the letter aloud. Cold tears began to well in her eyes. Could she now write _River of Silence_? Now, as death came to knock and lay in wait outside her door? "I have no other family…"

Her words were so soft that Amelie could barely hear them herself. Erik reached out to lay a comforting hand on her shoulder, but she saw him withdraw as he thought twice of breaching the space between them.

"You cannot…" He began.

"But I _must_!" She cried angrily. Erik would not imprison her now! Not after everything, and certainly not when she was to lose the one of the people she held most dear. "You will not hold me here, Erik, so help me!, you cannot hold me here."

"It was our one arrangement," Erik replied sternly.

"No, Erik, when I arrived we agreed on three terms; you have already broken one. Now I shall break another." Amelie retorted. She knew it was a bitter blow to invoke an event he still managed to apologize for with every breath and every action, but she was desperate. If Erik would not let her go, then she had no choice. "Madame, how could he have even found you?"

"He did not find me," Madame Giry spoke softly with a voice drenched in fear. "You see, Madame Michaud, we discussed that I had seen you. Your uncle had the letter delivered to her, seeing as she was the last position you held before your father's death. Madame Michaud passed it to me, and now I have come here."

"So it is still a secret? We are still safe?" Amelie asked.

"We?" Madame Giry raised an eyebrow and smirked. "You are. No one knows, except me."

"Hopefully that does not extend to Meg," Erik growled. "She was such an infernal gossip!"

Madame Giry said nothing; she dare not defy the Phantom.

"I will go," Amelie adamantly declared before Erik could even open his mouth behind the mask to further interrogate poor Giry.

"Fine," Erik replied gruffly with a strange irritation that sounded both angry and protective. "For how long?"

"For as long as it takes."

"You will write."

"Are you asking?"

"Did it sound like a question, mademoiselle?" Erik snapped. " _Of course_ I am not asking. You _will_ write. I must know your whereabouts, every interaction with every person; in my own self-interest of course."

Amelie raised an eyebrow. _Of course_ it was in his self-interest; but whether that interest were truly his desire to allow the world to still think him dead, or whether that interest was to ensure Amelie returned, by or against her own will, had yet to be determined.

"Fine I will write. As your humble servant, have I any other choice, _monsieur_?" It felt odd to call him by the customary greeting now. She had known him as Erik now for what felt like an eternity.

"None at all, in fact." Erik turned away from her. "Madame Giry, you will escort her. Find her a carriage, and carry all of our correspondence. I expect the bell to ring at least once a week; 2 days for her correspondence to reach you and then 2 days for you to pass mine to her. The postal roads should be adequate this time of year, save the springtime rains…"

"Yes, monsieur," Madame Giry replied obediently. "As soon as I receive a letter, it shall find you."

"Or else the lasso-"

"Monsieur!" Amelie snapped. She had heard enough about the lasso for one day. "I shall write you as often as possible, always your humble servant."

"I hope that is enough to make you return… I will find you if it is not."

The gold eyes glowered with threat again, but Amelie felt no fear. If there was one thing she had learned about Erik, it was that he truly was only a man.


	14. The Letter Part II

Erik had forgotten how empty the home on the lake felt when the only soul inhabiting it was his own. He had experienced the heart-breaking revelation twice before: once when he first met Christine and realized that the home he had built was not a sanctuary, but instead a prison; the second when he lost Christine and he realized the prison was actually his tomb. He had similarly spent the first few days of Amelie's absence motionless in his coffin, devoured by the cold air that suddenly felt like thick, black, decay filling his lungs, until Feste's cries of hunger became relentless and unbearable.

As Erik tore gobbets of bread, morsels small enough for Feste's tiny beak and belly, he could hear Amelie's voice in his mind scolding him for letting the poor creature go hungry.

 _After all the inspiration he's given you!_ She would cry indignantly.

"I didn't feed him at all until you came here!" Erik snapped. His words echoed unanswered through the shadows, as Feste only cocked his small head in bewilderment before flying away in fear.

 _And that's why he was half-starved._ Amelie replied. _I must insist you continue to satiate his appetite until I return; I shan't forgive you if he dies._

"Of course you _shan't_ ," Erik said drolly as he finished his chore and trudged back inside.

He hadn't received a single letter from Amelie yet, though it had only been a few days. Erik knew he would have to wait at the very least four days until he heard from her, with six being the most likely arrival date of her first letter. Could he will time to move faster? He found his hands itching for his opium pipe again, a vice he had almost completely avoided since music had engrossed his mind completely once again. And while he was able to steer himself away from the thick, hazy smoke and subsequent stupor, Erik felt no need to deny himself the simple joy of drunkenness.

Erik had always struggled to find that fine line between the warm, giddy sensation of alcohol in one's veins and the blinding, tragic, and consequently painful, feeling of alcohol infecting one's body. He knew the drinks were poison, quite literally, but nonetheless, he consumed gulp upon gulp, glass upon glass, until he could consume no more.

The first stage of his drunkenness led to writing of music; typically, all the notes were utter nonsense and sounded as such, demonstrating the extent to which his senses were inebriated. It seemed even the slightest influence against their favor led to his music's total and utter demise. Nonetheless, Erik's pride swelled as he realized his own genius, his great mind's ability to compose such unearthly sounds. They were alien and foreign and wonderful (until he came to his senses and realized the drunken pieces were only pretty when experinced through the haze of alcohol).

The next stage was anger, and his wrath was mighty! Amelie's absence, and the lack of letters four days later, could only have meant her imminent, if not already executed, escape and betrayal! How foolish could he be to not think of her as his hostage? Even after the weeks in comfort and friendship had passed, was he really so completely foolish and obtuse as to think he could be forgiven? And now she had lied _again_ and Erik would be left alone _again_. After five decades of hatred, fear, and abandonment, one would expect he would finally accept the nature of his existence. Wildly drunk and alone, he could finally at least see the truth for himself. Sweet, painful _veritas_.

The final stage of drunkenness was arrant, all-consuming desolation. To be alone again! It was as if all the pain of every memory flooded him; abstract but overwhelming. He could recall no individual tragedy on its own but instead experienced all of them at once. The tears fell freely and his long, bony fingers clawed at the skin of his bare face. Blood coated his hands and Erik reeled at disgust of the feeling of his own, delicate, disgusting skin beneath his nails. The skin ripped like wax paper in smooth silent sheets and the blood formed oozing, thick channels, warm as it ran down his face. Erik was suddenly keenly aware of how his skin must feel cold as a long-dead corpse to the touch of any mortal man.

Finally, though, the bell told Erik of his salvation.

"Madame...Giry?" His head throbbed and bombarded him with evidence of his horrible, poisonous rampage the night before.

"Monsieur! Monsieur I have a letter!" She called across the lake.

Erik pulled himself slowly, but methodically and with all the grace he could muster, to his feet and moved himself from the house to the lake to the boat. He pushed the boat across the water with automatic movements that would have unnerved Erik had he not spent so many years alone in the darkness, navigating every inch of it perfectly. As he moved towards Madame Giry at last, she extended a quivering hand towards him, outstretched with a small, enveloped letter. Erik snatched it away the way a starving, homeless mutt snatches scraps of food.

"Now begone!" He cursed with an exhausted wave of his arm. " I'll find you tomorrow. I shall have my response prepared by then."

"Yes, Monsieur!" Madame Giry seemed already to have turned to flee from him before even providing her own response and he did not mind. In fact, Erik was grateful for her leave. Madame Giry had done much good for him, she had brought him Feste and Amelie, the two things he now treasured most in the world, but he had never quite felt a great positive energy from her presence. Indeed, the woman only reminded him that he was a monster to be feared. She could only ever see him as _monsieur le fant_ _ô_ _me_.

But the letter! Sweet salvation, the light to lead him from his loneliness and solitude. It was all he could do not to rip it open desperately! But he could not risk damaging even a single letter, so he eagerly rowed the boat across the lake once again, then gingerly, delicately pulled the wax seal from the parchment to reveal Amelie's strange handwriting. It was tall, long, and thin, but not at all compressed, with the smallest of flourishes on the capitals of each sentence. Erik smiled. He had seen her letters so many times before but now, with her absence fresh and painful, he tenderly realized that he had to agree with Madame Michaud: the connected letters were messy. Quite unbecoming for a governess… thank goodness Amelie was now a writer instead!

 _To my dear friend, Erik,_

"My dear friend…" The words and the realization attached to them seemed unfamiliar to Erik. But how could he, after all they had shared together, think of them as anything less than friends?

 _The road to Soucia was long. You were correct that the postal roads were in better condition; the ground was dry, but what we gained in speed we sacrificed in comfort. My neck and shoulders ache from the constant jousting and shaking, and I think I could feel every small pebble as if it were a giant boulder below the wheel spokes. And the wheel spokes! We broke three over the course of the two days!_

"Three?! What incompetence!" Erik exclaimed in exasperation. Who was he talking to? He didn't know, but when he spoke it felt more and more like a conversation with Amelie. He could almost imagine she was sitting there on the divan watching him draw and compose, interjecting with curiosity.

 _When I arrived, Uncle Henri was still walking, but barely. In the countryside he could not find a hospice care professional and I think this may be one more reason why he sent for me in such a desperate fashion. Can you imagine? Sending a letter into the vastness of the world, only half hoping for a reply, when on your deathbed?_

"' _Erik is dead'_ ". Yes, Erik could imagine. He had done it before.

 _When I think on it, it makes me feel as though the world is nothing but an endless, empty expanse. I think of pushing it from my mind, but then part of me feels as if this is the exact mindset I must adopt for River of Silence; a vast, hollow world full of transient, fleeting beauty... Both an homage to one's love and a recognition of the fragile nature of all things in life._

 _Isn't that a comforting thought, though? That all things are temporary. Pain, suffering… all of it will pass. Of course, inevitably, the good in things must pass as well, but it's a cycle. I quite like thinking on it as such._

A subdued smile crossed Erik's mangled mouth. Amelie truly was such a young creature; she had so much to learn and see, but it was a joy watching her formulate these shameless epiphanies. He remembered how many he had burned through in his own life. He had dabbled with this philosophy himself, in fact. It resembled the religions of the India where the words of the Buddha still rang true. But Erik had found his pain and suffering relentless through his life and so could not ascribe to such a philosophy. What's more, now that he held something good and true to him, Erik could not bear to think of it as fleeting. The thought caused him unbearable pain and so he shook it from his mind wearily and continued to read the last portion of Amelie's letter.

 _I digress. I write without thought and with complete and utter abandon. For are we not friends? Regardless, I find myself incapable of restraint now. I've enjoyed too much the honesty with which we speak and the quiet comfort of your companionship, and I feel no shame in divulging such reflections to you, Erik. I look forward to a letter from you._

 _Your faithful servant,_

 _Amelie_

Erik's pulse stopped and skipped. _I look forward to a letter from you_. Well, of course she did! That was their agreement: 2 days between correspondence on both sides. After reading her letter, however, Erik realized that he had nothing of significance to write.

He would try nonetheless.

 _My dearest Amelie_

Too much fondness! She had only written to him as a "dear friend" and Erik dare not surpass that new rank and standing.

 _My dear friend Amelie,_

 _I have received your letter._ No! Of course he had received her letter, why else would he be writing in such a timely fashion?

 _Thank you for your note._ Erik grumbled to himself in dissatisfaction.

 _Your new philosophy resembles that of the Buddhists in India. They have studied such philosophies since around 595 BC, long before the time of Christ. There are some 84,000 tenants of the Buddha's teachings. Should you choose to read them, I have obtained many works regarding philosophy and religion throughout my years of travel through the region. If you are so inclined, I shall send an introductory work with my next letter._

What in heaven's name was this drivel! Was Erik only capable of providing her with an unsolicited lesson in Far East history and religion? Fighting the urge to angrily tear up the entire parchment and fume in his coffin with the opium pipe nestled so comfortably between his bony hands with their paper thin skin, Erik pushed adamantly onward.

 _I am sorry to hear of your uncle's condition. While I do not wish him death, I do wish him a gentle passing or a swift recovery. Your company will do him good and I am sure that he feels miraculously blessed to have found his letter to the void answered, and so quickly. Where will you tell him you've gone? To a position in Paris? To Prussia? To Austria?_

 _Perhaps we may yet go to these places. Writing to you of India has made me feel a curious urge to take you there._

This last sentence troubled Erik not because of its fact-based nature but because of the ease with which he wrote something so incredibly honest. _Emotionally_ honest. Though Erik loathed the idea of walking amongst men again, as he certainly would not don the disguise of a leper in any other city other than Paris where he risked recognition for certain crimes, it seemed more bearable in the company of another person. Specifically, a person who enjoyed his company and could be trusted not to stare at him with the wonder, horror, and curiosity that his mask so often evoked.

 _My best to you and your uncle._ What an incredibly vapid and pedantically cordial statement. Henri was dying; he needed more than Erik's "best".

 _Your humble servant,_

 _Erik_

That night, Erik stole away through the darkness to deliver the letter to Madame Giry's abode. He considered donning the fedora and black cape that he had always worn when he stole through the trap doors and rafters of the Opera House, but it seemed ill-fitting. Instead, he wore the ragged, heavy cloak that reminded him of Amelie's earnestness and ingenuity (a memory tainted with his own self-loathing at his destructive treatment of the girl). He left the letter wax-seal facing up and then returned to his underground home by the lake.

More music had demanded to be written and an image, burned in his mind like a brand, required release through charcoal and parchment.


	15. The Secrets

**A/N: Hi everyone! First, I'm so sorry for how long it has been since my last update. Things get crazy and there's been a lot going on this past week, so thank you for your understanding! That being said, I'm probably going to start updating once or twice a week max; though I have almost the entire story written (I'm only one or two chapters away from the ending!), proof-reading a zillion times does take time, and I don't want to post anything I'm really not happy with. This chapter itself was a bit of a compromise for me, so please review and let me know what you think!**

As always, thanks for reading you all are wonderful (:

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Chapter 15: The Secrets

Amelie's return to Soucia felt more bittersweet than before. This time, her childhood home would hold no family to speak of when she knew she would undoubtedly leave and the thought clouded every beautiful sight and sound in a haze of misery. Though the wonderful countryside remained pristine and untouched, a refreshing reprieve from the burning of coal in factories and fireplaces surrounding Paris, it nonetheless felt tainted by the cold hands of Death. Upon Amelie's arrival light snow and rain still glistened across the countryside, but to her utter delight, the temperatures had increased to a cool, consistent, and comfortable climate within only the span of a week from her departure from the underground house by the lake. It would be an earlier spring this year, she could tell, and thank goodness!

"Uncle, we need more light in here!" Amelie pulled open the curtains that sheltered the white brick rooms from the gentle, warming rays of sun that morning. "The dark won't heal you."

"Nothing will heal me," Henri growled. "It's consumption. I'm already dead."

"The doctors said rest and fresh air will help you get better," Amelie corrected sternly. When she had arrived, Henri had been mysterious and unclear about his condition but when Amelie entered his bedroom for the first time to wake him late in the afternoon and found the scarlet, phlegmy handkerchiefs surrounding his bed, she knew he his ailment immediately. She also knew that rest and the cool breeze from outside were unlikely to do any good at all… but she had to take some form of action and the doctor _had_ prescribed sunlight and fresh air. To Amelie's dismay and great vexation, her uncle had digressed as a result of his impending death into an angry, rambling old drunk who spoke of nothing but his demise until he ran out of wine. Then, he only tantrumed about the lack of wine. When at last Amelie caved to his childish fits, the cycle would begin again.

One week had progressed this way since she had left the underground home she shared with Erik and Amelie found herself anxious at having not yet received a letter from him. Soucia received a post delivery from the city every two days, and so she had twice made the short trek from the white brick country house back to the village to the small post service.

"Good morning, young monsieur, anything this morning?" She asked. Amelie took advantage of the opportunity to live amongst mortals again by dressing in her nicest frocks (today's was a navy pattern that complemented her pale skin and tawny coloring) and reveling in the warm walks to and from town.

"Today? Yes mademoiselle, a letter for you!" A young boy, no older than 16, managed the post office today in place of his middle-aged father.

"Thank you! Where is your father, is he well? What is your name?" Amelie asked, finding herself scarcely able to contain her excitement. She feared her joy at having received a letter from Erik would obscure her very real worry about the boy's father.

"My name is Tomas, mademoiselle," The boy replied as he postured himself proudly. "I am working in place of my father, he-... He has consumption."

"Consumption?" Amelie frowned gravely. If consumption had come to roost in Soucia, all the village inhabitants were at grave risk of infection and death.

"Yes, mademoiselle. We won't close _la poste_ , my aunt will come in and manage should the need arise, but father asked that I warn people that the disease has come to town. With your uncle, and the farmer out east of the town as well… that's three…" Tomas held up three fingers forlornly.

"My prayers for your father, Tomas, I will say extra for him tonight. Rest and fresh air, that's what the doctor prescribed for Henri. Don't let them bleed him! I've heard nothing but even swifter death for those who accept such treatment."

Tomas's eyes widened and Amelie instantly regretted her negligent, ill-advised words. What if his father had already been bled? How could she have been so inconsiderate!

"I'll tell him straight away, mademoiselle. We will see you again this afternoon?"

"Yes, Tomas… I'll return later today."

Amelie snatched up Erik's letter, clutched it to her chest, and turned on her heel to leave swiftly. Her cheeks were flushed with regret and shame and her heart felt heavy and sad as she imagined the gelid, frigid figure of Death following her once more.

Amelie read Erik's letter with utter delight during her walk from the town to the white-brick home on the hill. She could feel the apprehensiveness in his words and found it painfully endearing. Though they had only spent a few months together, Amelie had grown accustomed to their quiet, comfortable coexistence. Few words passed between them, but that did not mean things were left unsaid. Their conversations were held in music and monologue, in the simple gestures of exchanging tea and knowing glances, in preparing meals for and awaiting Feste's song. Erik was not a man of many words; those he spoke were perfectly calculated and careful to never reveal too much. Instead, the gestures from his long, terrifyingly elegant hands, the beautifully consuming songlike tones of his voice, and his music, perfect and pristine, conveyed what his guarded temperament would not allow his words to say.

How could she respond to such a letter though? At the forefront of her mind was the outbreak of tuberculosis of the village, but mentioning such a development would inevitably lead to Erik seizing Amelie and returning her to the safety of the underground house by the lake. The thought had its own certain appeal; she would be away from her ornery uncle, away from the despotic, bleak nature of Death, and away from the curious eyes of the village. She had already managed to draw attention with her sudden return, her sickly uncle, and the way with which she eagerly sought out letters every few days. It was attention she would have happily done without and it only reminded her that she could not make a single move, as an unmarried woman, without each detail being devoured and analyzed by a curious and not-always-well-meaning audience.

No, Amelie knew she needed to write of happier times. It would be easy enough. Despite her misgivings, Amelie still felt a strong fondness for the lake country. She had walked the banks of _le petit lac de Clairvaux_ , crisp with the lingering winter air and she could see the buds of beautiful lavender and yellow flowers waiting for the warmth of spring to settle upon them and lead them towards bloom. Then, Amelie realized that this could be the subject of her letter. What better topic to write on than the _Valley of Many Colored Grasses_? What better inspiration than the vast fields at the foot of majestic, violet mountains, colored by blue purples, scilliant yellows, vivid shades of green ranging from the darker forest hue of the great trees that spotted the fields to the bright, dancing grasses and cat tails surrounding the shining waters of the lake. It could not have been a more perfect inspiration. The only thing left to the imagination was the spotlight of the warm rays of sunshine upon the lovers' field, which darted behind clouds waiting for its magnificent entrance into the clearest of skies that would surely arrive with summer.

Amelie filled her letter with such descriptions, and pondered how long it likely had been since Erik had felt the sunshine on his face or seen fields and rivers and lakes that spotted the countryside outside the heavy air and the streets of Paris. Would he remember the sights she of which she now wrote? Would he remember the smell of flowers in cool spring air? She longed to show him, wished he had been on that long carriage ride with her from the city to the countryside, and thought fondly on the prospect of travelling with him (even to India, a land of which she had never even dreamed of seeing with her own eyes!). Amelie could imagine him growling and sulking about the wheel spokes breaking and could paint a picture in her mind of him frowning from behind his mask.

Ah, the mask. Still it remained, despite all the progress and fondness and respect between them, Erik had never shown any signs of intending to remove it in front of her. Did it bother him as much as it bothered her? Perhaps it was second nature to him and he did not even think on it, but to Amelie it stood between them like a canyon she could not cross. Still she did not pry, though, for fear of what she may find beneath it.

"Death's head," She said to herself softly as she sealed her letter to him with a small wax seal with an embellished "A" on it. Could his face truly be so horrible as to burn away all the fondness she now held for the man behind the it? She remembered the almost-transparent look of his skin and the sight of muscle pumping beneath it as he spoke and grit his teeth together the one time she stood close enough to Erik to make out those details. Amelie scolded herself for gasping at the sight. Truly, it wasn't as awful as she had expected. After all, the rumors had said he had no face at all, just a bloody mass where skin did not grow, covered in scabs that ripped and tore, causing blood to gruesomely ooze, as he spoke. The rumors also said he was a crazed killer but Amelie had found those rumors untrue as well. Nonetheless, what she _had_ managed to see underneath the mask still startled her, yet Amelie remained convinced he was just a man; a talented, sensitive, albeit cynical and violently temperamental, man that she could now call her friend.

A small _pitter-patter_ in her heart startled Amelie. Perhaps she were growing to think of Erik as something _else_...

No! Such a thing could not be, not after all he had done to her. Though the bruises had faded, the marks and scars from Erik's various assaults still lingered fresh in her mind. Amelie could not allow herself to be owned by such a man. In her vision for her life, the man she would marry was gentle, kind, and amicable towards everyone. Erik did not suit that vision, with or without the mask to hide his physical features.

Amelie pushed the thought from her head and went back to town to send the letter; a letter which detailed none of her potential feelings and no mention of the tuberculosis outbreak. And so, the secrets began.

Amelie returned, after delivering her response to Erik at _la poste,_ to the white brick house she shared with her Uncle to hear voices inside. A deep frown made its home on her brow at this; who would dare visit a man known to have tuberculosis? The townspeople shuddered at the thought of even Amelie living there, insisting that he be sent to a tuberculosis hospital to wait out his days, but she would hear none of that. He was the only family she had left. But what kind of stranger would visit a man on his deathbed?

She cautiously opened the door and something as heavy as a rock made her gut sink; she knew the man immediately before he had even turned around, but it was not the man she so desperately wanted to see.

 _No, I do not_ want _to see him. I am quite well here without Erik, as free as ever._ Amelie scolded herself for her impropriety yet again. Those sentiments needed to be restrained.

"Monsieur Moreau," Amelie greeted Theo with a cool nod.

He turned and Amelie could hardly stifle a laugh. He held a cloth up to his face and his eyes looked desperate and scared, even with Henri shouting at him as best he could from across the living room. She could make out the same hints of disgust now as she had seen when Erik the Leper tried to reach out to Theo. It was just as repulsive as the last time she had seen such behavior.

"Amelie, mademoiselle!" Theo exclaimed with the same boyish elation as last time he greeted her. It seemed he had forgotten the flare of his temper or his hot declaration that he _would_ have Amelie. She set her square jaw tight, ready for the battle that would no doubt ensue. " _Un plaisir!_ "

"It is indeed. It's very kind of you to come visit Uncle when he is so ill," Amelie offered cordially.

"Oh mon ami, very sweet of you, but you must know I am here to see you!" He replied with a jovial grin as he briefly exposed his face from behind the handkerchief. In the flash of a moment, he seemed worried, as if he had forgotten himself, and quickly replaced the small cloth against his mouth once more.

"I wrote him…" Henri interjected, clearly seeing the discomfort scrawled across Amelie's features. "He had written me before to tell me of your rather uncomfortable meeting in Paris. I thought it would be so lovely if we could all make amends on my deathbed."

Amelie subdued a glare at Henri. How positively evil for him to use his death as an excuse, as a bargaining chip in this horrid game for Amelie's freedom and dignity!

"There is nothing to atone for or mend," Amelie replied, careful to keep her tone clear of any emotion. "Theo, old friend," She added for good measure. "I hold no ill-will towards you for your proposal, I simply cannot accept it."

"Ah, Amelie, stubborn as ever," Theo said with unmistakable fondness. Such tenderness terrified Amelie; he had been so cruel at the end of their last meeting. She rubbed her wrist as she felt Theo's violent grip upon her anew. "But I've come to stay in the country. As long as you are here, so shall I be. This way we can get to know each other; a proper courtship, just as I said before. If at the end of it, you still feel as though I am ill-suited for your hand, then I shall leave you in peace for the rest of our days and wish you nothing but the best."

Amelie hesitated. Perhaps this was a genuine offer. If so, it was not entirely unreasonable. She may have been hasty in writing him off purely on principle, but this way she would not have to sacrifice any of her values should they seem a good match. Additionally, unlike Erik, Theo seemed everything that any young woman could desire. His curly brown locks and blue eyes and fashionable dress made him an attractive man, even despite an unusually round and dimpled chin. He had stable work, educated work!, and apart from his angry outburst, a sunny disposition.

Perhaps she had been too hasty, indeed.

"Theo, I appreciate your patience," Amelie said slowly. She could see Theo bracing for whatever answer she should give and found herself momentarily enamored with his unabashedly honest demeanor. "Your proposal sounds wonderful. Though I still do not appreciate the two of you making arrangements without my knowledge, your offer is respectful of my wishes and for that reason I must accept. You will call on me again tomorrow. It is getting late and I must soon take Uncle to rest."

"Of course, Amelie. But I wish you would let me bring in a hospice caretaker. It simply isn't safe for you to tend to him yourself. You've no medical training and, heavens!, you're still so thin! You must not be in good health yourself." Theo replied approaching her. Despite Amelie's willingness to accept his offer, she still remained intimidated by his movement and felt oddly prisoner by his presence.

"I must admit… I would appreciate the help of a hospice worker," Amelie sighed. Henri was a large man and his needs were great. She felt ill-prepared from the moment she arrived, an exhaustion that her sore, tired muscles and the dark circles under her eyes only served to bolster.

"Then you shall have it!" Theo exclaimed with a happy clap of his hands. "I shall send for one this evening, someone from Paris whom I would trust with my life."

Amelie sighed heavily with a breath she did not know she was holding, releasing a burden she did not realize she carried.

"Thank you, Theo," she said softly.

As Theo picked up his hat and coat to leave and made the cordial, customary goodbyes, Amelie felt remorse at another revelation: Ashamed at herself, Amelie realized she would not write to Erik of these events, either.


	16. The Turning Point

**A/N: Hi! I promise I'm still alive! Thank you so much for your patience and continued support. This chapter was _really_ difficult for a couple reasons. First, I lost the original draft and was never able to recover it. Honestly I can't even explain what happened. It just wasn't there one day, and if it was well it must be a ghost! **

**Second, rewriting it was incredibly difficult. I had experienced it all once but couldn't remember exactly how the smaller details played out so it was really difficult to write. Along that vein, editing it was even more difficult, and the final product looks nothing like what I had originally planned.**

 **Third, I've had some rather stressful personal developments that have kept me away from writing and really prevented me from dwelling too much on this work. One could say I've been ripped away from the fantasy for a little bit. I'm working my way back though and excited to finish this up!**

 **That being said, this is the last chapter that our two friends will be apart, so I appreciate your patience. It's an "Amelie-focused" chapter but don't worry, the next one has got some real quality time with Erik and a huge development in our story, so please bear with me. We're on the homeward stretch, y'all!**

 **Please review... I'm desperate here. :) Enjoy!**

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It was a strange sensation for Amelie, to rekindle a friendship when Death moved silently around her through the walls of the white-brick cottage on the hill. The two childhood sweethearts began a ritual of long walks back and forth between town, fetching supplies for the nurse to support Henri (including wine, despite everyone's best efforts), and picnicking as they used to as they read the poems of William Morris to each other by the lake. Theo would bring cheese and cherry jam on fresh, crisp baguettes, just as Amelie's mother used to, and she found herself charmed by his magnanimous and charitable nature.

Every action evoked her fondest childhood memories. Theo would sit by the banks of the lake, untroubled and unfettered by Amelie's exposed ankles and calves as she dipped her feet into the cool crisp waters to counter the heat of the spring sun. She listened as his higher-than-Erik's tenor voice read the words of _Earthly Paradise_ and allowed her mind to wander through the stanzas that twisted and guided across the lands of the Greek myths and Norse minstrel's songs.

"Morris's use of tetrameter is quite a refreshing development, don't you agree?" Amelie asked with a stretch and a contented sigh as she propped herself up from her comfortable recline in the flowers, under a tall, leafy, oak tree. The sun had grown too intense for her pale skin on this day and Theo insisted that she move away from the lake and to a spot under a tree to avoid sunburn.

"I must admit, my darling, that I'm quite unfamiliar with such 'developments'," Theo replied with more than a little embarrassment. "My education extends to the law with only a perfunctory knowledge of classics. That being said… I remember Shakespeare would use iambic _pentameter_ , and I can hear the difference."

"Then your understanding is sophisticated enough," Amelie declared with feigned authority. "Read me again the first stanza of the introduction, would you, Theo?"

"Again?" Theo grinned. "But we've read it at least 6 times already, once everyday since first I brought it to you. And that's in iambic pentameter, not at all one of the 'developments' of which you are so fond!"

"I know, but something about it rings familiar in my mind… I can't quite place it, but I would very much like to hear it again." said Amelie wistfully. As he began reading, Amelie still couldn't quite explain why it resonated within her so, but something about it _did_ remind her of the underground house by the lake.

" _O LOVE, this morn when the sweet nightingale",_ Theo began softly. Despite having read the lines so many times, he read still with the same dramatically gentle air as if coaxing Amelie into resignation with each syllable.

" _Had so long finished all he had to say,_

 _That thou hadst slept, and sleep had told his tale;_

 _And midst a peaceful dream had stolen away_

 _In fragrant dawning of the first of May,_

 _Didst thou see aught? didst thou hear voices sing_

 _Ere to the risen sun the bells 'gan ring?_

The stanza itself was an incomplete thought, only a smaller part of a whole. But to Amelie, it felt like the entire story; a bird's song, sleep, a dream, the rising of the sun and singing of voices. She thought of Feste with fondness and missed him dearly, thinking upon the dream that was her time by the house of the underground lake. Amelie could have thought it all a dream indeed, had it not been for her continued exchange with Erik through their biweekly letters. Or perhaps it was these days by the lake that were a dream, and she would wake to find herself once more in Erik's company, writing their opera, listening to Feste's song. Oh, she had lost none of her fondness for those days, but she felt addicted to the breeze by _le petit lac_ , the smell of the sweet flowers, the occasional buzz of a large bumblebee in her ear. Whichever of these two settings were a dream, Amelie could not choose which one she would rather be real. If only Erik and Feste could join her in the country, then perhaps she would no longer feel torn between the two worlds.

But no, such things were not possible, she thought with more than a hint of sadness. Especially not now, with her relationship with Theo having developed so significantly. Though Amelie had to admit, she felt nothing but a sense of nostalgia and forced affection for him; she felt all the tenderness of a childhood friend, but she could not imagine herself kissing him, could not imagine the profundity of a love shared between them that could last a lifetime. Perhaps she was being too fastidious; comfortable friendship did not a horrid marriage make. Despite her most rational thoughts, she wanted her heart to flutter and her pulse to race, to find her mind and soul stimulated and challenged, yet with Theo the only thing that raced were her thoughts beating wildly against such a match.

"We should return…" Amelie said softly, consumed by the darkness of her own thoughts. "Henri is so unwell these days, and now that your maid has left, I shudder to think of the thought of him dying alone."

"He has become such ghastly company!" Theo exclaimed, moving to stand from his spot. "But you are endlessly caring, and almost tragically sentimental, so I would not deign to keep you from him. Please don't stand so close, though, we would not have you fall ill as well."

It was a fear, catching ill, that Amelie harbored daily, one that only grew more and more vicious as she watched her uncle's state deteriorate. Theo's nurse had left days prior, refusing to inhabit the shared space when Henri was so near death. He had stopped eating entirely leading his once round figure to grow so thin that he resembled a corpse, and the blood on his handkerchiefs was fresh and appearing in greater volumes everyday. Still, Amelie fed his addiction to wine; she felt no need to deny a dying man the last vice that may alleviate his symptoms in even the slightest. Rest and sunshine, as the doctor prescribed, had done him no good, though he _was_ lucky to have lasted this long.

Lucky? What was lucky about waiting in bed to die with the hands of Death gripped tightly around one's soul?

"Thank you, Theo," Amelie smiled weakly, finding herself once more fall prey to the thoughts swimming frantically through the oceans of her mind. A storm brewed there, one of confusion, fear, affection, and longing.

Theo and Amelie returned and said their goodbyes, with Theo making no attempt to greet or see Henri. In fact, he refused to touch anything in the house whatsoever, a small compulsive quirk that Amelie had grown to loathe. He treated those with sickness as if they were dogs, just as he had looked with repulsion upon Erik.

"Henri, I'll have dinner for you shortly," Amelie called up the stairs. Typically, she would make him a warm broth with bread only to return to find the broth cold and the bread untouched, but it was a dance she carried through with perfect muscle memory all the same. But today, when no affirming grunt, groan, or cry of any form found her from upstairs, Amelie furrowed her brow. She moved up the stairs, calling his name between creaks in the old wooden boards.

"Oh, blast!" Amelie cursed as part of the old banister splintered into her palm. "Uncle?"

Still no response, and suddenly Amelie felt a cold through her body, a frigid chill as if Death itself had come upon her and devoured every ounce of light she had ever known. She cracked the door open and the stench of Death filled her senses; her eyes watered and her stomach threatened at the sight of Uncle motionless body, mouth agape, still propped up in his bed. The most horrid and pungent of smells, the smell of death and feces, accompanied by the sight of blood spattered down his mouth and chin overpowered Amelie to the breaking point and she cried as she heaved on the floor and collapsed, crying out loudly and shrieking her tears. Her hands curled into disgusted fists, slamming against the splintering wood, and she wished so desperately that someone, _anyone_ , could find her.

But there was no one there.

Finally, after an eternity spent in her own tears, near her own mess, surrounded by the most terrible reality of Death she had ever encountered, Amelie crawled from the room, still sobbing. Her chest heaved and gasped as she searched for air. The silence stifled her; the world was unchanged and unbothered by this most gruesome loss. There was no sound because, to everyone else and to the rest of nature, nothing had happened. She choked through another sob as she realized the absolute meaning of the emptiness of life about which she had written to Erik all those weeks ago. Everything was temporary, fleeting. The universe did not mourn that which was not eternal.

Amelie sat outside the room until it had grown very dark, almost as black as her mind and the sense of Death that pervaded her every move. She needed to go into town, to find Theo or a doctor, anyone who could help dispose of the body or at the very least make such arrangements, but she could not go tonight. For one, it would have been incredibly improper. For another, it would have been dangerous. Though she knew the way, she knew not what terrible tragedy await her through the doors. She shuddered at the thought of something worse outside than the monstrosity she had just endured.

With a wince, a sigh, and a contortion of her mouth as she sobbed again, Amelie wished desperately for Erik's company. Oh, she had missed him through the weeks, but not as faithfully as she should have. She had been distracted by Theo's charm, but in these moments, it was not Theo she longed for, but Erik. She longed to hear him play violin as she sat in front of the fire. She longed to see him downstairs, sketching with his charcoal; a constant in a world that had just turned upside down. Peering through the banister, Amelie half-hoped to see him there, as if he could sense her distress and answer her call. But the sitting room was empty. No warm fire blazed, for she had not lit one. No guests arrived, for she had not invited any. No warm dinner by the hearth, for she had not prepared one.

Independence suddenly felt like a prison of its own, a horrible lonely cell in which Amelie now found herself trapped against her strongest wishes.

* * *

Amelie did not realize she had cried herself to sleep until she awoke the next morning. She was met with a sarcastic sunrise, warm and inviting as ever with no consideration for the atrocity of Death still obvious and present, and went to fetch a rag with which to clean up her own mess. Despite requiring the assistance of a morgue to dispose of the body and she couldn't stop scrubbing at the floor, determined to get the stain from the contents of her stomach from the wooden boards before she contacted anyone else.

Finally, the boards were clean and Amelie had changed her dress from one of royal blue to another of black. The silence still permeated every pore of her body and devoured her into a void she could not articulate, had she even found the courage to speak, but she pressed onwards. To the town.

The scenery had changed drastically since her brush with vile reality. The Valley of Many-Colored Grasses of which she wrote to Erik no longer existed. The flowers had lost their vibrancy and the once-majestic mountains seemed more malicious than majestic, moving her maimed and tired soul even closer towards utter tragedy. Still, she pressed onwards. Amelie had managed to remember the most winsome words from Erik's last letter, and as she walked, she did her best to recite her favorite lines from him.

" _Feste grows more and more rotund everyday, but he is so contented that I cannot bring myself to stop feeding him. It is unhealthy in such a small creature which, as you may know, is already tended towards a shorter lifespan-"_

No, not that line; it was too close to death, though she did like the imagery of Feste fattened and content with his feathers puffed up to stay warm.

" _The music develops nicely. You will enjoy hearing it and it will remind you of better times, of this I am quite convinced."_

What Amelie wouldn't give to hear those sweet notes now. She wished she could return to the underground lake, to a time when she still felt pure and unfettered by the harsh reality that stood still, emblazoned in her mind. Of course she had known Death before, but her parents' passings had been so much… prettier. They were dark and tragic, but both mutti and papa had lain in perfect, still peace when they passed. It was easy to believe that they had gone to heaven. But Henri, a decent enough man in his own right… his passing resembled something much more hellish. Lord, let that not be his fate!

" _Your letters compare strangely to mine; they are honest words with honest intentions. Mine are not so… I've never been a good writer, and I hope you will forgive me_ _this shortcoming_ _. But you must know, I write only_ _to remind you that you are promised to this place until a time should I choose. Do not fall from my graces in favor of flowers and lakes; you have promised to return_ _."_

It was a threat intended to veil fondness, and Amelie needed to recall his fondness now, especially his endearing inability to adequately express said affection.

" _And when at last your duties in Soucia are fulfilled, we shall complete our opera. Then, what wonders may lay ahead of us! You are so young and sheltered, but I will teach you the vast expanse and multitude of marvels the world manifests. There is much to see and we will begin immediately; Sunday walks through the cobblestone city streets of Amsterdam, a wagon ride through the countrysides in Asia, a Turkish coffee house in Stamboul… and should you so choose we may return to Soucia, so_ you _can enlighten_ me _as to the wonders of a French countryside I have long forgotten."_

Oh to be so far away from Soucia now! As Amelie trudged into the outskirts of the town, she wished wholeheartedly to escape her hometown completely and so desperately yearned for Erik's friendship and-

"My dear, my dear, what horrible tragedy has befallen you!" Theo ran towards her most unceremoniously and grabbed her firmly by the shoulders. She felt no warmth from his touch, no great comfort save that which came from no longer suffering alone. The tears came in horrible, relentless waves… the sight, the smells, the sickness, Amelie could not prevent herself from dwelling on it, even now as Theo stared at her with worried eyes. Then, before she could even register, Theo embraced her. It was a different kind of prison, this gesture, one that made her feel smothered. She pushed away from him, still sobbing, yet his grasp grew tighter, tighter, and tighter still until she could no longer struggle beneath his strength. Instead, she continued sobbing from the panic of his restraint and the torment that had made its home within her.

"So he has passed. Do not worry," Theo cooed, his calm only increasing Amelie's anxiety. "Come, let us go to the tavern, I will contact the appropriate authorities and we can feed you and perhaps have some drink as well."

"Wine," Amelie said softly between her tears. "Just some wine, please."

A horrid stab in her chest as the thought of wine made her consider her poor, dead Uncle once more.

"Yes, my dear, of course." Theo offered Amelie her arm and they walked in silence towards the village, though the horror had not passed.

* * *

The funeral and subsequent sympathy gathering was held exactly two days later and weighing heavily on Amelie's mind was the knowledge that she had not written Erik; he would undoubtedly notice her mistake. She knew he would be furious, but part of her hoped he would be furious enough to ride to Soucia and seek her out. Heavens what she wouldn't give to have him, masked and dressed in wonderful black jacket and slacks, tall and menacing and mysterious, and fuming and speaking with angry abandon! Amelie craved his presence, desperate to escape the sad and disgusted faces of the village that now filled the downstairs home.

It was a marvel they had come to the house at all, given that they surely believed the property, and likely Amelie herself, to be completely consumption-ridden. Amelie attributed such a formal appearance to Theo but thankfully, despite his efforts, it had been a short service. Though the family of the post-man, the locals of the tavern, and other nearby rural inhabitants who had once known Henri coming to the house, none of them wanted to stay. At the end of it all, Amelie trudged up the stairs to her room seeking solace as the last of the guests left, only to find Theo standing in her chamber bent over her desk in silence.

"Who is Erik?" He asked with painful, threatening solemnity. "Who is this ' _companion_ ' you've been writing?"

Amelie's eyes widened. The tone of his voice was so menacing and so foreign; it could not possibly be the same man with whom she had spent such lovely days at the lake.

"He was my last charge in Paris," Amelie responded as calmly as possible. "In order to maintain my employment status, he require that I write."

"And did he also _require_ you to write of your fondness for him, of whatever this preposterous opera you claim to be writing?" Theo stared at her with vicious, unfeeling eyes, and Amelie suddenly understood the fear she felt around him.

"N...No." She said softly.

"I won't have it Amelie!" He snapped. "After these wonderful weeks we've spent together, I won't have you belong to another man."

"I _belong_ to no man," Amelie retorted. She could not hide the anger or the disdain in her voice, but she felt grateful for her time with Erik that allowed her to stand so adamantly for herself now.

"You belong to me!" shouted Theo. "After all these weeks of toying with me, of letting me believe that you loved me, or at least that you _could_ love me!"

"I never said-"

"You _made me believe!"_ Theo continued, blind to her words in his rage. He stood now, so close to Amelie that she could feel his breath on her neck. Nonetheless, she stood strong. She withstood Erik's kiss, she could withstand Theo's.

Then, he struck her. It was a touch she was not prepared to withstand, and it knocked her to the ground with its force. Amelie tasted the blood from a split lip fill her mouth, and she choked back a sob. He would not see her cry, not now; it was a form of intimacy, of vulnerability, she would not allow to stand between them. Theo would not know anymore of her after this.

"Monsieur, I think it best you leave,"

"No… no, not this time," He chuckled in a horrible combination of disbelief, exasperation, and rage. "No, this time, I'll not leave and neither shall you. _Welcome home_ , my dear."

"You can't make me stay!" Amelie spat.

"If you leave, it will be only because you committed suicide, finally broken by the loss of your uncle and your family," Theo growled ominously. Amelie's eyes widened at the threat.

"Theo, I'm sorry… I thought perhaps I could accept your proposal-"

"And I accept your acceptance!" Theo continued with wild eyes that refused to meet Amelie's own. "We will marry within the week."

"Theo, no, I won't, you simply cannot make me!" Amelie shrieked at him.

"Be silent!" He commanded. "Do not bring me towards violence again, I loathe harming you. But you must see the error in your games and your folly; you _must see_ that you will be happy with me, the two of us together just as everyone thought; a childhood romance story!"

"This isn't a romance novel, Theo. I am free to make my own decision!"

"And now you know the consequences of those decisions," Theo growled. "Are you so willing to pay with your life?"

Amelie hesitated. Her freedom for her life, or her life for her freedom?

"As I suspected… your haughty ideology only extends so far," he said. Amelie glowered at him. It was a challenge. "You will write to this _Erik_ fellow…. Now!"

Amelie scurried to the desk now willing, if only for the time being, to obey as the force of his hand still lingered on her swelling jaw.

"Write to him and tell him- god your letters are pathetically awful- that you'll not return, that he can send your final wages here (or not at all for all I care), and that you never loved him."

Amelie turned to look at him with steely eyes.

"I never said I-"

"Do not be so stupid, Amelie," Theo retorted. "Anyone could see that you have played me for a fool and that you love him!"

"Is there nothing between hatred and love in your eyes?" Amelie muttered to herself with all the loathing she could muster. Having heard her words, he grasped her brown, messy hair almost to the scalp and yanked her back forcefully.

"Care to elaborate?" Theo threatened.

"No, _monsieur_ ," Amelie mustered all the venom and malice she could in her words. If she were her prisoner, caged like an animal, she would certainly behave like one to the fullest extent of her ability.

It was a new prison, and there it lay bear to Erik in the form of her messy letters.


	17. The Return

**A/N: Thank you so much for your reviews and messages about that last chapter; I'm glad it went over better than I expected and I hope that, even if I didn't hear from you, you enjoyed it!**

 **We've still got a couple big things ahead of us, but at last I bring you an Erik chapter and their reunion. Woo!**

 **Please review :)**

* * *

Amelie's letter did not arrive upon its intended date, and the distress it caused Erik was beyond words. The music had stopped and Feste did not sing; the days had no beginning, no end; the hours in the coffin seemed endless and unrelenting. What Erik would have given to hear that bell ring! The bell had been placed to prevent intruders, yet now it felt as if it could only bring salvation.

Had it not been for Feste, Erik would not have left his coffin at all without the soft _ting_ of the bell to lure him from his own morbid nest. But the poor creature seemed ill and unwell; he sang rarely, instead only chirping when Erik brought him bread, though the bird would not eat. In response to this development, Erik sought to recreate what he could remember of the gypsy remedies, uncertain and apprehensive of their effect on birds. He only allowed one drop on one morsel of bread but when Feste did not recover Erik soon gave up on this method. Amelie would not forget him should she know Feste had grown ill and Erik had accidentally harmed the bird with his home-made concoctions.

Also weighing heavily on Erik's heart was the way he had written Amelie with reckless abandon and an honesty both unfamiliar and unprecedented, only to find himself dwelling in a purgatory of loneliness and anticipation. He had spoken of the wonders of Rome, of the beauty of Persia, of the great streets of Amsterdam, all in hopes of evoking inspiration for their opera, for the poor creature still could not write _Ephemeron_. Though his attempts at giving life to the words for her seemed futile, Amelie had nonetheless sent inspiration in return. Oh, the words and the beauty rang through him hopelessly. For the first time in years, Erik felt himself _longing_ for the world of men. How could he have forsaken the beauty of an isolated house in the countryside for the underground? He wanted desperately to see the lands of Soucia at the foothills of the mountains, to walk with Amelie by the banks of the lake. And she had written him of desiring such.

" _How long has it been since you have seen the light of day away from the darkness of the city?"_ Erik asked himself in her words. Typically, it felt as if he spoke with Feste, imagining Amelie's words and hypothetical responses coming from the beak of the creature. Sometimes, Erik felt as if he could not distinguish fantasy from reality; perhaps Feste spoke, but perhaps it was simply his imagination filling the void of silence that the absence of his music now created.

Over and over again, Erik's ruthless and unforgiving memory imagined Amelie's hazel eyes staring at him through tears as she said the words over and over again in his mind,

"I've never been in love-"

And now?

Erik pushed the thought from his mind. It seemed as though absence did indeed make the heart grow fonder. They had spoken of a fondness for each other's company that words they would have never dared to say before; by god, their relationship had consisted of such few words to begin with! Perhaps the words would have become more clear if they had remained together, through progressing actions or softly spoken sentences, but Erik could not imagine himself ever speaking with such honesty as he did within their letters. It felt so profoundly uncomfortable to write such sentiments that Erik could not even fathom a world in which his awkward mouth and strange limbs could convey similar affections.

 _They are honest words and honest intentions._

That was what Erik had said of Amelie's letters, and he had meant it completely. Amelie's words spoke of fondness and longing for companionship, simple and veritable, but Erik strained for more than that though he spoke not of it in his letters. He hoped for everything he had seen in Christine.

A living bride.

It was that ephemeral goal that evaded him endlessly that evoked the words from him. Erik had written Amelie of travel and adventures they could hope to share together. Oh, perhaps it was not the most _obvious_ tactic, but could he have done any better? They had spoken so few words together, but they had shared so many unspoken hopes! Her hope for solitude and his for companionship, hers for escape from a world that could not give her the freedom she longed for and his for comfort in the wake of an unfathomable disaster, and both of them undeniably seeking something entirely more profound. At least on that, even without words, they could agree.

Erik had written an entire letter to Amelie detailing such sentiments, a letter not yet sent. He had drawn confidence from her own words in _Mare Tenebrarum_ ,

" _From madness comes the strongest intellect…_

 _And mad is the only thing worthy of being._ "

Those words, in particular had spoken to him. Erik's soul felt confidence in her words and a cautious voice told him that _perhaps_ he belonged. What a very strange feeling, indeed! But with credence in his instinct that perhaps she could care for him in a more profound way, Erik felt the words within him; words asking Amelie to be his. He knew them awkward and unpoetic, but he hoped that Amelie could accept his offer nonetheless… If only he could have played his music for her, then she would understand! Perhaps she felt the same and would accept his offer of travel, freedom, and companionship, but Erik knew the mask still stood between them. For whatever beauty Amelie could see in him, it was no beauty underneath. What she saw lay inside his music, in his words, in every part that he had shown _save_ what hid beneath his mask.

Then finally, _finally_ the bell signalling Madame Giry rang. But this time, she did not call for "Monsieur le fantome". She stood silently and, as Erik fervently pushed the boat through a lake that felt as thick as bog, he could hear her soft, fearful whimpers echo through the caverns. Still, he could not feel anger… only hope.

"Monsieur, I so apologize, please…"

"Silence, Madame Giry, I want only explanations," Erik offered as gently as possible. Clearly she had one; the fear in her eyes indicated she knew something dire. He only hoped it was not of Amelie. Perhaps _la poste_ had failed, perhaps the roads were too rainy to travel (the gutters were pouring viciously loud against the caverns indicating days of rain). But Madame Giry cautiously handed him a parchment, already torn from its careful wax seal, without explanation. Erik felt his temper bubble.

"And _why_ , pray tell, have you opened my letter, madame?"

"Pardon, monsieur, I did not know it was from the governess. The return of post was separate, belonging to a man…"

Erik did not let his eyes betray his sudden frustration.

"Go now, woman. Leave me!" His long, lanky arm made a sweeping gesture that had barely finished before he turned back to the row boat. His mind raced wildly at the thought of Amelie in the company of, in residence with?, another man, a man who did not hide behind a mask or keep secret parchment sketches or sleep in a coffin.

But the letter detailed exactly what Erik had feared.

 _Erik,_

 _I write to inform you of a development. Though it hurts me to write these words, I must say succinctly that which rings truest in my heart. I do not love you._

It was a punch to the chest, a horrible choke in his throat. Erik could hardly contain a gasp. Love him? They had never spoken of love, not in such simple or plain terms. Yet here, she spoke with complete carelessness, an abandon unfamiliar and unwarranted.

 _These past few weeks I have spent in the company of Theo, the young man from the market._

Curse her! Erik could not help but crunch the letter between his bony fingers and palm as his hands grew into fists. A horrid shout into the darkness echoed through the underground house; it was part rage and part turmoil, a shout and a wail all at once. Erik could hear nothing but the pounding of his pulse and the heaviness of his chest heaving desperate inhales and exhales in rapid, merciless succession.

 _We are to marry within the week._

The harlot! The siren! The horrid, frizzy-haired woman who had done her best to evoke Erik's trust and friendship, his affection and longing even. His body grew stone cold in its rage, no longer desperate but suddenly calculating. _She would learn_.

 _Do not come for me. Do not write me. I ask only that, if you have ever cared for me, you leave me be. Allow me this last freedom._

Freedom! How _dare_ she speak of freedom now. Had Erik not granted her freedom once?

"Only to be denied and betrayed once more… women… wretched creatures… Erik is a fool! A pathetic, lonely fool! He will not be betrayed again!"

His hands quickly found his lasso.

 _Yours in regret,_

 _Amelie_

"Regret! No, my darling, you do not know of regret, not yet!" Erik shouted into the darkness, his hands curled into angry fists one against his lasso, the other crumpling her letter and throwing it back into the lake outside.

Feste did not sing a song of forgiveness as Erik made for the Rue Scribe entrance. He stay still in his cage, unmoving, his small chest breathing heavily but silently indicating exhaustion and illness in the sad, small creature. _They have such short lifespans after all,_ Erik fumed as he donned a fedora and a cape. He would find Amelie. She and new lover would both answer to the Phantom of the Opera and his lasso.

* * *

Erik rode through the night and the next day, stopping only to allow Cesar a modicum of rest before continuing onwards. He took no time to appreciate the countryside and felt no desire to compare Amelie's descriptions to reality. To Erik, it could have all been a wasteland; none of it mattered. Only the feverish, fervid, all-consuming loathing and hatred, a mask of its own kind that concealed the fresh wound of betrayal, existed for Erik. That and Amelie… but he could not bear to think of her now. Instead he allowed his skeleton-like body to move automatically with awareness only for its lust for vengeance and the base, animalistic pursuit to satisfy the horrid tempest of emotions within him.

But when finally he reached the lake country, Erik felt himself growing weary. He was not as young as he once was and Cesar protested the heat of the spring sun upon them both with a huff and a whinny bemoaning his exhaustion. Erik lept from the poor stallion gracefully, even more careful now to shroud his mask and limbs behind fedora and cape. Perhaps the mysterious, violent affair of the Opera Ghost had not twisted its way into the mind of the country folk, but Erik could not risk recognition regardless. It was a burden he could not trust his temper to withstand.

As the sun began its slow, relentless sinking across the horizon, Erik finally reached Soucia. He had made remarkably good time, but at the expense of Cesar's sanity and well-being… the poor creature! Instead of dragging him onward, Erik took him to _le petit lac_ , his own pulse racing at the proximity to his destination, and left the horse to drink and graze without the burden of what actions were to follow their arrival.

Erik could not bring himself to relax his balled up fists and could not calm the overflowing well of emotions within him. Part of him wanted to compose himself and face Amelie with the same stoicism with which she approached him; he knew it would cause her immense agony to think that all their companionship had meant naught and she would not be able to withstand anymore of the charades. The child would crumble or she would not care; either way, he would know her true self. But Erik was not capable of such action! He had withstood the cruelty of women before with surprising compassion, given his circumstances, but he could find no compassion now. The betrayal was poisonous, the wound festering, the venom coursing through his veins.

 _The white cottage in the countryside…_ Erik searched his surroundings from the lake, but his eyes did not fall on the cottage. Only a dirt road leading up a small hill disguised by two great oak trees at its pinnacle. He followed the dirt road, further agitated, but surprised that he even could focus through his tunnel-vision long enough to notice, by the dust gathering at the foot of his black slacks and the bottom of his cape. Finally approaching the top of the mountain, Erik could see through the dust and dusk… Amelie's white cottage at the top of the hill. It was quaint, a simple architectural delight which suited the quiet simplicity of the countryside; Erik would have appreciated it had circumstances been different, but now it looked more like an unkempt jailhouse. His prisoner lay inside.

But as he approached the cottage expecting silence or jovial chatter, Erik heard only sobbing. Careful not to be noticed, he pressed his long limbs against the wall between the window and the door of the cottage. No hearth glowed from downstairs, only a single, beacon-like candle from an upstairs window… the same window from which he heard familiar sobs.

" _Stop it! Stop it at once, I can't stand to see you cry anymore!_ " A man's voice snapped. Then, the voice turned softer and more gentle. "I don't want this to be our life together… we could be happy if you would just _stop crying!_ "

Erik's brow furrowed underneath his mask. This certainly did not sound like the happy union that Amelie described in her letter. Perhaps this was the wrong cottage after all... A twisting feeling devoured his gut and Erik quickly considered his next actions.

 _"I hate you, Theo. I would rather die than… than live like_ this." The gold eyes beneath the mask widened. Her voice was full of venom, hardly the stoic or strong tone he had grown accustomed to, but there was no mistaking it was Amelie. He knew he had recognized her sobs! He knew her voice!

With absolute and unmitigated silence, Erik's long, delicate hands opened the door but he stopped as he entered the home. It felt like a tomb, smelled like death… and that was not his interpretation or imagination. The air hung heavy and stale and would have choked him had Erik not grown accustomed to the more unsavory and unsettling aspects of life so long before. _So_ , he told himself, _Henri must be dead._

"Don't say that!" Theo snapped. The sound of skin meeting skin with force of anger caused Erik to wince for a brief moment and his hand reached across his body to immediately tighten around the lasso that hid under his cape. The sobbing stopped.

"Thank you, my sweet…" The crazed voice grew softer again. What kind of madman could this be?

"Do not call me that!" Amelie cried. Erik's long legs pulled him up the stairs, his hands never once reaching for the old, splintered oak banister, until he found himself outside of the candle-lit room. It was a bedroom. He could not stop his hands from shaking as they reached out for the door, could not control the blood racing through his body with deafening force, and could not silence the deep, swimming sound in his ears that stifled his hearing.

Unable to withstand the torment, Erik finally opened the inadequate barricade between them. Amelie sat curled up in a corner of the room, opposite an untouched, pristine bed topped with a blue, wool cover. Erik turned his attention back towards Amelie, whose balled up limbs tensed with shock and her mouth fell agape. Her square jaw was misshapen with a bruise on its right side and her wrists were sloppily bound and raw, no doubt from attempts at escape, Erik deduced. Her face was stained with dirt and clean, pristine lines of tears had made trails down her abused cheek.

"Erik…" She whimpered before choking and coughing out another sob.

"Erik? Opera Ghost or imposter?" Theo asked, unable to mask the terror in his eyes. The fear inspired Erik and before either could take action, the lasso was around the man's throat, stifling desperate attempts at air and oxygen. Oh, Erik could have snapped his neck easily, but his rage burned too much for that. He needed to feel the life slip in frantic increments away from Theo's body, desperately longed to hear him choke and gag, sputtering and spitting through his final moments.

"Please, please, Erik stop!" cried Amelie. His bewildered eyes found hers but his powerful hands released none of their grip.

"You would save him?" Erik asked through clenched jaw and gritted teeth. "You would save your attacker? Why, because you _love_ him?"

"Because I could not have you be a killer for my sake!" Amelie bawled. "You are no longer the Phantom or the Ghost, Erik, you're only a man."

There was little time left for a decision; Theo's desperate squirms grew weaker with each movement, the choking more fervent as his body realized more and more the futility of its attempts. Erik waited, waited just until the man's body went limp, then released.

"You've killed him…" Amelie's voice was soft but there was no mourning in it, at least not for Theo's death.

"Don't be naive, I haven't killed him," Erik snapped. "Though I should. He does not deserve mercy. You're a fool, Amelie. A damned fool."

"A fool who needs these ropes cut and to be returned to her home. Please, please let us forget this."

Erik searched Theo's jacket, finding a knife in the inside pocket, then cut Amelie's ties. He nearly flinched at the sight of her red, raw and almost-bloody wrists. Of course she had not been a willing prisoner… how could he have believed…

"I came here with the intention of harming you." Erik confessed.

"I know," Amelie replied, wiping snot beneath her nose and wincing as her forearm brushed too forcefully against the painful bruise on her jaw. "I knew you would. That's why I fought. I knew you would need to see…"

"To see you like this?" Erik snapped. "You mean to tell me you withstood this, you fool!, to prove a point? Are you truly so careless, so dense as to think that-"

"Yes." Amelie replied, setting her jaw as firmly as possible. How could she still have fight left in her? After four days of this torture, how could she still bear to stand against Erik's own temper?

All at once, she stood taller, her face reaching up toward Erik's until her lips found the cheek of his mask. As Erik stood motionless in the face of this unforeseen event, she rested her temple against the barrier shielding her from his sallow cheek.

"Please… let it be done. Let us go home."


	18. The Mask

**A/N: I really feel the story coming to life here at the end chapters; honestly, everything that happens is beyond my control at this point. The characters are playing out on their own, so who knows where we'll end up, now? Certainly not I.**

 **Phluff? Some. Enjoy and please review!**

* * *

The return to Paris would take three days. They rode slowly and Erik remained vigilant against straining Amelie, beyond the obvious discomfort she displayed since he found her huddled in a corner in binds and tears. The image burned in his mind and brought forth a cacophony of emotions impairing any of his more rational senses. Perhaps most deafening of all, though, was the silence that hung between them. For Erik's part, he could scarcely think what to say. When he finally found words, he wanted only to scold her for her carelessness. He wanted to chastise her for failing to write to him of Theo at all, a betrayal that emblazoned itself across Erik's soul in the form of his broken trust and suspicious mind.

When these tantrums consumed his conscience, Erik forced himself most unpleasantly to dwell on Christine. His scoldings of her and his temper, among other more, one could say, _sinister_ things, had undoubtedly scarred their love as much as his horrid face and he could not follow this path again. He imagined Amelie's square jaw set with wavy, loose curls as a cinnamon frame for her features, then thought of them looking upon him with the same fear Christine once displayed. Could he bare to experience such tragedy twice? A deep, hollow feeling made it's home in Erik's chest and gave him his answer.

"You haven't eaten since we left," Erik noted coolly. He wished he could nurture Amelie in these moments of fresh, tender injury, but instead he simply curled his hands into callous fists. "I won't have you starve. Eat."

As they sat in the confines of a small, rural hotel room somewhere outside Sens, Erik pushed a baguette and jam towards where Amelie sat on the floor. She did not raise her eyes, she did not shake, she did not quiver; only sat in silence, rode next to Erik and Cesar in silence, and pretended to sleep in silence. The profound quiet served only to make Erik painfully aware of his own mortal frame; with nothing to disguise his feeble human sentiments, they felt consuming and overwhelming.

"If you will not eat, then speak, damn you!" Erik snapped, stepping away from the heap of woman on the floor. "Or sit in a chair at the least." He gestured with a bony arm towards a chair near a small table against the wall.

"I'm tired, Erik, I do not want to talk. Let me sleep," came her soft reply. Erik almost turned to face her, inspired and dismayed by finally coaxing words from the poor creature, but instead continued facing towards the small window that allowed only the most miniscule amounts of moonlight to shine in upon them. Erik had taken the liberty of lighting a few candles, but only enough to allow Amelie's eyes to adjust to darkness once more.

"You must explain yourself to me," Erik replied as gently as he could, clenching his fists tighter. "You must tell me why you never wrote me of your most horrid suitor or of your Uncle's death…"

"I didn't want you to worry, Erik," Amelie's voice continued with an unbecoming cautiousness. Despite himself, Erik felt his grip tighten once more until he felt his own bony fingers burrowing into his palms violently.

"And this was a more desirable outcome?" Unable to bear it any longer, Erik turned to face Amelie. Still, her unrelenting stare stay fixed towards the floor.

"I never intended for…. Please, Erik… could we not simply forget it all? Forget it all like a horrid dream? I should quite like to wake up again to how it was before, in our letters-"

"In our letters?" Erik could not hide his hot disbelief. "Our letters were lies, by your own choosing."

Finally, Amelie raised her stare to meet his and Erik wished wholeheartedly that she had not. The strong eyes that had once held a hint of humor before she had left for Soucia now held no shine, save that of a wall of tears barely barricaded behind her thick eyelashes and heavy, puffy lids. Though Erik wished to comfort her, he found himself incapable of doing so. He could not breach the betrayal between them.

"Lies?" Amelie asked, closing her eyes in what Erik could not decipher as a sign of acceptance or a wince of pain. "I never lied; omitted, but never _lied_. I wished to share Soucia and the lake country with you, Erik."

"And did you not, mademoiselle?" Erik sneered with a sinister point in her direction. "Look at where we are? It seems you have indeed lured the Phantom from his cave."

"Don't start at that, Erik," Amelie's tone warned but none of her features supported her stance and so Erik continued.

"Tell me, what did you say to make the boy love you to the point of madness, mademoiselle?" Erik asked. "Did you write him fancy sonnets? Did you read him Shakespeare and romances? Did you make him believe that you loved him?"

"Yes," Amelie replied flatly. Erik could not stop his eyes from widening or muscles tensing at her show of honesty. "He wanted to make a courtship and I allowed him to call on me. I was lonely and Uncle was so ill…"

"You never intended to return to me, then?"

"Please, let us not speak of this, Erik… please, I beg of you…"

"You never intended to return, did you?" Erik cried. He tried desperately to hide the fear from his voice but could not disguise it with enough anger. "You would leave the Phantom, with his new, unfinished opera, with his songbird that will not sing, you would leave him alone instead for your pretty boy with money and his wonderful face and his eloquent words…"

Defeated, Erik slumped in a rickety wooden chair that stood near a table pushed against the wall and rested his head in his shaking palms.

"Please, Erik… no…" Amelie moved across the floor, still never bringing herself to stand, until she sat near enough to reach out to Erik's leg. "I knew I would return to you…"

"Forgive me if I fail to find your words convincing, mademoiselle," Erik grumbled through the hot tears forming behind his mask. "I am not as gullible as your countryside lover."

"Do not call him that, Erik… please, I beg you, never that."

For a brief moment, a pang of empathy and regret coursed through Erik's cold, angry veins.

"He has lain hands on you…" Erik's words were so soft as to barely carry across the room.

"But I am not… his… if that is what you mean to ask," Amelie's disgust permeated every syllable she spoke, but Erik only felt his shoulders slump forward in relief.

"How long was it until… since he…"

"Four days. Two or three days for my letter to reach you then your time riding to Soucia. I did not expect you to make it before the week was out."

"Then you expected to be married?"

"I expected to continue my disobedience. Even Theo knew he could not marry me without my consent. I would rather die-"

"Do not speak such words!" Erik snapped viciously. He inhaled deeply and lifted his face from his hands before continuing slowly. "The man now knows you have lived with the Opera Ghost. The manhunt will begin again. We cannot return to the house by the underground lake."

Amelie's eyes widened but Erik did best to maintain a steely disposition.

"But Feste? Our opera?"

"We must leave it all behind."

"Erik, absolutely not. I'll not allow you to leave Feste down there to die, not after all we have been through, us three together!" Amelie's eyes grew wild as she scooted away from Erik. "With or without you, I am returning at least to fetch our muse. He cannot stay there alone, he'll die!"

"Can't you see you've left us with no choice?" Erik spat. "This entire charade you've been leading, dallying with the law student, playing out a fake engagement in the countryside, it has cost us Feste and our home. We cannot return and you will not go without me. I shan't be made a fool of twice."

"Curse your pride and suspicious mind, Erik! You can't leave the poor creature to die!" Then, she began sobbing and Erik felt his resolve dissipate. Oh, the resentment and the wound was still there, but Erik had to admit the thought of leaving their poor, sickly song bird, if he were still alive at all!, tugged painfully at his own soul. Compounded with Amelie's tears, it was too much to bear. He knew he would give in to her every whim if it meant he need never see her tears again, just as he always had with Christine.

"If we go, will you spare me the sight of your tears? Even the Phantom cannot bear to look upon them now," Erik resigned softly. Amelie looked at him, wiped the trails from her still-bruised cheek and set her features with a solid resilience.

"If the Phantom will keep his word, then I will withhold my tears as best as I can."

"Then we shall return," Erik's hands instinctively ran to rub the bridge of his nose. "Though I must say once and for all, this is against my best instincts and you have proven your own to be wildly untrustworthy."

"Perhaps… but I'm only human, Erik. I am not infallible."

"You should have known better…"

Amelie scooted closer to him once more and reached out to lean her head on his bony knee until Erik jerked away automatically. The regret filled him almost instantly and he wished he hadn't, but it was a movement beyond his control.

"You're guarded again, Erik," Amelie's voice was only a wisp, something mournful that could have been carried away on even the slightest breeze and never heard again. "I deserve it. I only wish we could have the life we spoke of in our letters. I am a horrible, wretched woman. I deserve it."

Her hand ran against her swollen jaw and Erik felt his hand lift from his knee. It moved on its own to caress her, as if it were a limb belonging to someone far more capable of tenderness and romantce than he, but before it could reach its destination and carry out its act, Erik snatched it back. _She does not deserve_ that _,_ he told himself. _She does not deserve to be touched by yet another monster._

"Sleep now, Amelie, poor child…" Erik cooed as his hand hovered above her hair. The memory of Amelie's lips' pressure against his mask burned in his mind and he wished to touch her, but still his hands shook. "We will return to Paris tomorrow."

"Yes, Erik. Thank you," Amelie replied softly, never meeting his stare again. She finally lifted herself off the floor, her body moving as if it were permanently weighted down by some odious anchor, and moved to the bed where she burrowed into the covers and finally slept soundly.

* * *

"You never told me he was ill!" Amelie shrieked. "Perhaps to _you_ our letters were lies, but to me they were not!"

"My dear, it seems we both kept our secrets then," Erik replied viciously. He paced the floor in front of the fire as Amelie stood next to Feste's cage perched carefully over the writing desk. Inside, the black-capped songbird's body heaved and collapsed with each breath, his eyes not open at all.

"Erik, what are we to do! How could you let this happen?" Amelie's eyes were wild and Erik could see her struggling to withhold her tears of despair. They had returned to the underground house by the lake against Erik's best inclinations, with the intention of fetching the few belongings they could need and Feste. Yet when the arrived and Feste did not chirp or sing, Amelie immediately escalated into a frenzy, hurling blame and insults at Erik for not caring for the bird more adequately. "You told me he was fine! Rotund! Fat and content, you said!"

"Can you not see he has grown fat?" Erik sneered, extending a bony finger in the direction of the creature. He scolded himself for sounding so callous when, indeed, finding Feste in such a poor state caused him dismay in equal measure. The bird was his muse, his teacher, his guide away from Erik's life as the Phantom; and now it seemed the poor creature would pass just as Sasha had before him.

"Don't mock me, Erik!" Amelie's eyes burned into him and Erik's hand reached up towards his face to confirm the mask still lay between them. She had a particular talent for making him feel so bare under her stare. "Please, can't you give him a tonic? Anything to help?"

"I've already tried that, my dear," Erik did not bother to hide the forlorn nature of his words. "It did not escalate his poor condition, but it did nothing to help it either."

"Then we must leave immediately!" Amelie declared, frantically gathering together items from the desk. Erik would have found it amusing that she clawed at and clutched useless parchments and empty inkwells had she not done so with such pathetic desperation. "He needs sunlight and fresh air, to live like other songbirds."

"Ah… I see… of course nothing could live down in the shadows with the Phantom," Erik noted sadly.

"Erik, stop this nonsense," Amelie stopped dead in her tracks and stared knowingly at him again. Blast! Could she see everything? "This isn't about the Phantom or the Ghost or you or I, even! It concerns only Feste, his well-being. We must leave at once."

Erik fought the instinct to roll his eyes at her melodrama and at the realization that she would gladly leave for Feste but had seemed so resistant to Erik's own decree that they need depart from the underground house by the lake.

"I'll retrieve food from the Opera House kitchens, enough for the journey to Calais which will take us to Amsterdam quite conveniently…" Erik said aloud, but more to himself than to Amelie, who he believed now found herself trapped in hysterics beyond reason. Blast women's fragile natures! Before she could reply, Erik had already donned his felt hat and cape and left her alone to cry and bemoan Feste's poor, failing state.

* * *

Amelie's jaw throbbed and her wrists burned as she reached up to run a comforting hand across Feste's feathers. The bird sat upright with its eyes closed and feathers puffed out, breathing heavily yet without sound, and Amelie felt the same frigid chill in her bones that she had when she first realized the loss of her uncle. All the events had happened so quickly that it overwhelmed her to a point of cold, indifferent numbness; of course, she wanted to save Feste, but Amelie knew she did not experience this fear in all the raw, frantic melancholy one typically does. Instead, it came in pieces. She screeched at Erik insisting they not leave Feste, then they rode in utter silence; she lamented Feste's state rather dramatically, then she sat on the floor in silence while Erik went for food; she more than dreaded the prospect of Theo's appearance at the underground house by the lake, but she found herself incapable of taking any meaningful action to evade such an encounter.

Then there was Erik! Wonderful Erik who had saved her, but also the Phantom who had almost strangled Theo without hesitation; caring Erik who needed to know that Amelie's dignity was still in tact, one-in-the-same with the Phantom who had cursed her and accused her of wretched deception. And the cursed mask still, _still_ , remained such an insurmountable obstacle between them.

Amelie grit her teeth together, despite the pain in her jaw, and vowed that such a thing would continue no more. Curse her stoic acceptance of Erik's continued control over every situation; the mask lent him the authority in every interaction, and now, after everything, Amelie demanded they truly be equals. Of course, she would not be fool enough to simply rip the mask away… no, she would not risk igniting the anger of the Phantom… but there were other secrets Erik kept, and she knew where to find them.

Peering over her shoulder in constant caution of a ghost that was not there, Amelie made her way across the living room and towards the door that held Erik's chamber and his coffin. She hesitated, trying to slow and quiet her breath, before reaching out to open the door. When at last it creaked open, she saw the same neat disarray she recalled from before. A black, satin-lined coffin sat in the middle of the room with a mess of parchment to the foot of it, littered against a cold stone wall. Amelie made way towards the parchment, heart beat roaring through her body. As her hand reached out to turn over the top piece, she hesitated.

Did she truly want to see what lay deep within Erik's mind?

Yes.

Amelie turned the parchment only to find herself staring into a mirror. Her own tear-filled eyes peered up at her from the parchment, her face built from negative space and long, smooth charcoal lines. She gasped at the recognition; this was her when she had attempted to viciously trap Erik with memories of Christine, only to crumble at her own recognition that she had never truly loved. Frantically, she reached for the next parchment, recognizing her own small, delicate hands carefully tearing at pieces of stale bread for Feste. And another; her secret, gentle smile as she read _Twelfth Night_ all those months ago, when the darkness was new and Erik still just strange and aloof Monsieur who sat across from her in silence. All this time, he had been studying her, watching her, learning the hardly-perceptible smile lines and concerned creases around her full mouth and wide forehead.

Amelie couldn't help but note how soft and pretty the girl who stared up at her seemed. Was this how all the world saw her? Or perhaps an artist's rendition, the figment and creation of a mind that desperately sought beauty and wonder and hope?

"Ah, I see we've found it in our nature to continue crossing lines that should not be crossed," Erik's voice was soft, not threatening, but Amelie could hear the shame in it. "You know, I had never intended for you to see them. In fact, I had quite intended to burn them upon your return. What use would I have for carrying around parchments when I knew I would have the model itself at my disposal?"

"Erik… I didn't know," Amelie replied.

"Didn't know what? That from the moment you arrived you had captured my full attention?"

"I had always thought myself troublesome, unwanted, until that point at which I ceased to be a governess and-"

"Ah but you see the governess was one of my first and few friends," Erik noted, setting down a small basket of supplies he had no doubt rummaged from the kitchens.

"And this one?" Amelie held up the portrait of herself in tears.

"A memory of the first moment I truly saw, veritably understood, what lay beneath the governess; something so slightly wicked, but so utterly desperate… _longing_ for something she had only ever imagined."

Silence between them.

"All this time you've seen me…. Studied me…" Amelie began slowly. "And yet this mask still lay between us."

"So it shall remain," Erik's wonderful, dulcet tones cooed and warned. "Those who have seen this face draw back in fear and disgust."

"I have seen horror in a man's face, Erik; it comes from his eyes, not from his skin."

At this, Amelie saw a small portion of his resolve falter, but not enough to lead him to remove the mask.

"You've seen what the Phantom can do; when I held that wretched boy's life in my hands, did you see the horror then?" He asked, his voice suddenly pleading like a small child's, desperate to hear the answer he wanted, but resigned to disappointment all the same.

"No, Erik," Amelie said softly. "I saw only the eyes of a man trapped in a moment when all else seemed futile and death the only solution. Then, I saw it disappear. You are only a man."

"I have wanted nothing more than to be ' _only a man_ ' for as long as I can remember, my dear," Erik began softly, moving towards the parchments and taking the one of Amelie reading into his hands pensively.

"Don't you see, you have been all along?"

"I have been a monster my entire life!" Erik snapped. "And the world has never let me forget that fact."

"I've never seen a monster. Not when you first kissed me, not when you hissed your insults at me, and not when you would grab my wrists and arms, always demanding your boundaries and your control. I only saw a man experiencing fear. Please, Erik, let me look upon you."

"You would run from me."

"I am running _with_ you, not away from you. But you cannot continue to treat me this way; I deserve to know you."

" _Deserve_?" Erik's eyes narrowed. "You _deserve_ none of this and certainly not to be forced to look upon this face. Is it not simply enough to know me as I am, to think of me without the horror of this corpse I am forsaken to exist in?"

"Erik, I respect you enough to not rip your shield from you. Yet I can never kiss you, can never hold you the way you should be held, can never kiss your forehead so long as the mask lay between us."

Amelie saw Erik's eyes widen at the realization that she could even consider such actions.

"Do you… mademoiselle I must ask… _could_ you love me?"

"I do, Erik, very much, indeed." Amelie forced her tired body towards him, dropping the parchment mirrors to the floor, and cupped his masked cheek in her hand. Through the mask, she could see tears form in his golden eyes. His gloved hand reached up and hovered above hers against his cheek tentatively, as if he could not bring himself to fully commit to the action. Then, he inhaled sharply before placing his long, bony fingers atop hers.

They stood there in silence, carefully nurturing the moment between them until Erik finally, with a shake of his head, tore himself abruptly from Amelie's touch.

"Come, child, you are shaking. Sit by the fire, let me make you tea. Then, once you are more composed, we shall depart."

Amelie smiled weakly and nodded. Tea sounded lovely.


	19. The Kiss

**A/N: Nearing the end; I hope you've enjoyed so far, and thank you for your support. Please review! Especially in these final chapters, I'll need as much support as I can get. The story is deviating from the original plot, and I'm not sure exactly where we'll end up!**

 **I may even be convinced that to change the genre from "Tragedy" to "Drama". Let me know what you think!**

 **Here we go!**

* * *

Chapter 19: The Kiss

In light of Amelie's profession of love, Erik found himself rooted firmly in place. Whether the hollow, anxious pit in his stomach bound him to the earth or a desperate need to maintain the precious, precarious balance of the universe planted him in place, he could not know; but one thing was certain: Erik never wanted to leave the safety of the underground house by the lake. Not now.

Yet, against his desperate desire to continue their vignette uninterrupted and unfettered by the reality that existed beyond the dark caverns, Erik knew he needed to depart. Calais did have a certain appeal; the ports had maintained status as one of the most diverse trading posts in France since the Middle Ages. It connected easily to Britain and Amsterdam while the old city itself, built between a complex of canals and harbors, held potential for a new home. Erik had found trade cities easier to disappear into; people hardly make note of a man in a mask when innovations and oddities are such regular occurrences.

It would be easy to leave Amelie behind, Erik told himself. Then again, the wiser part of him knew that perhaps 'easy' was not the most accurate description; the deep, insatiable hunger for love and affection that took hold of Erik's sanity long ago would typically require that he never allow Amelie from his sight again. She needed to be held, protected, _forced_ to stay, if that was what it took, because this opportunity to be loved was a precious, funny thing that Erik knew would never happen again. They had now spoken so many words together that the thought of return to silence was crippling in its finality. He could not survive the loss of love again.

As Amelie slept, Erik tried to channel his melancholy towards the last of their opera, _The River of Silence_.

"The star-shaped flowers shrank into the stems of the trees, and appeared no more. The tints of the green carpet faded; and, one by one, the ruby-red asphodels withered away; and there sprang up, in place of them, ten by ten, dark, eye-like violets, that writhed uneasily and were ever encumbered with dew," Erik read softly aloud, careful not to awake the sleeping seraphim with russet hair and bruised jaw that slept on the divan across from him. The realization made his cold hands grow colder; Amelie had written to him of their own version of the _Valley of Many-Colored Grasses_ , and yet that place no longer existed. Soucia had shrivelled and died, now doomed to live only as a reminder of betrayal and Amelie's days in the captivity of a man who could not stand anything less than tyrannous possession of the object of his affections. Her lavender and saffron flowers lost their beauty, the trees were less lush, and the clear waters of the lake were undoubtedly tainted by the memories entombed on its banks.

"And the lulling melody that had been softer than the wind-harp of Aeolus, and more divine than all save the voice of Eleonora, it died little by little away, in murmurs growing lower and lower, until the stream returned, at length, utterly, into the solemnity of its original silence," As he read, Erik realized that the logical version of _River of Silence_ would play on the central motif of _Song of the Ephemeron_. It followed; the River of Silence was neither exactly a place or a thing, it was an aura and an atmosphere, the bookends of a wonderful, innocent love.

Perhaps this was why Erik could not find the melodies within himself. He hoped he never would.

"Your voice is enchanting, do you know that?" Amelie asked, her eyes freshly opened to the world and still puffy with sleep.

"It's a talent of which I am very much aware," Erik replied. "I have abused it significantly many times."

"But never to me?"

"I suppose the need has never arisen..." Erik pondered. He recognized Amelie's game almost instantly; now her own profession of love stood between them alongside Erik's mask. She would say anything to pry it from him. "Yet."

"And I very much doubt it ever should," Amelie said with a sleepy, shy smile. "Has Feste's condition changed at all?"

"Alas, no…" Erik's voice trailed off. "Amelie, mademoiselle, I believe we have no more time here. We have dallied enough. I find myself at an impasse in which I must offer you a choice."

Amelie's brow furrowed.

"What kind of choice?"

"A choice that I found myself utterly incapable of giving Christine," Erik felt his body tense. "You must understand, by now, that I may always find reason to run. The world is not a forgiving place for one such as me and I cannot guarantee compassion on behalf of the rest of the mortal race. In fact, if anything, I can guarantee the opposite. As I have come to care for you, I cannot subject you to such a fate without granting your leave."

Amelie's eyes searched his, processing what little she could based on his own demeanor.

"You mean to send me away?"

"No, child… ah, you see I mean to allow you the opportunity to leave," Erik's long fingers curled into sad, unforgiving fists beneath his gloves.

"Then you release me from our agreement, from my service?"

"Blast it, yes, that's what I am telling you!" Erik snapped. Must she be so difficult? It insulted him to have her inquire so much when his meaning had been so terribly plain.

"Erik, I thought you never would," Amelie smiled and Erik felt the strings in his heart pluck a final chord at the realization that she was overjoyed at the thought of leaving. Erik was a fool for not slipping away into the darkness while she slept, he told himself. At least then the decision to be alone would have been his own cognizant choice instead of a heartbreaking ruling uttered against him. "I thought forever we would be bound by those few words we had exchanged as strangers. Now we can be free of those at last. No trace of the Governess or the Ghost lay between us now."

She stood, rubbed her wrists as she remembered the affair with the sinister, foolish boy had not all been a grotesque and horrible dream, and approached Erik. He inhaled sharply, drinking in the meaning of her words hesitantly, as she came close enough to rest her head on his gaunt chest. Hot tears formed in his eyes.

"I choose to stay, Erik. I have found in you a companion both comforting and challenging.

I would go anywhere with you and be content to have you with me."

"You would choose a life of uncertainty… of pain?"

"I choose a life in which I am _free_ ; to go, to stay, to suffer, to love. I choose all of it. I never had that freedom before you," Amelie pulled away only to stare up at Erik with those warm, hazel eyes. Her voice was so soft and so gentle but it berated the carefully constructed barriers Erik had worked so hard to build around himself.

"You would choose this…" Erik's hardly whispered aloud, his hands moving to his own face, still protected by the mask. Amelie moved her hand up to meet his, hovering by the cheek. He felt her fingers curl around the side of the shield, so permanent a part of his face that it felt as if she grabbed his own, paper-like skin with her delicate fingers. Erik saw her hesitate as they both realized his sharp inhale and bated breath. There would be no undoing this moment.

She pulled the mask away as gently as one removes a bandage from a still festering wound and as her eyes searched his ghostly flesh, they held all of the remorse, fear, and pity that Erik had grown to loathe.

"Even you, who claim to love the Ghost, cannot look upon him without pity and disgust!" Erik snapped, turning from her. She gasped and rushed to stand in front of him again.

"Erik, you speak of your face as such a monstrosity, you cannot rationally expect that I should see it and have no expression whatsoever. I look upon you with remorse for all the pain I'm sure you have endured. I look upon you with pity because no human should experience so much torment for something beyond their own control. But I do not look upon you with disgust. Yours is not a death's head; in fact, I have never seen another human being who looked as alive as you did in that moment. You're full of feeling, of life, and now I feel blessed to be able to look upon the man I…." She hesitated. "The man I love."

Before Erik could react, her lips were upon his. He could feel his mouth tremble against the pressure of the plump, bottom boundary of her mouth, soft and pillowy. It was _wet_ , not at all the chaste brush of skin against skin that Christine had bestowed upon him so long ago. More than that, it was fearless and hungry; two things Erik could not have expected of a woman who had only days ago been bound and imprisoned and at the whims of a crazed man. Amelie's whole body now pressed against him as her lips continued to gently caress and hug the thin skin where full lips never grew; she was so terribly, wonderfully warm and soft that Erik thought he would simply melt into her, content to no longer be himself at all. He wanted to give in to all the force her love, to the one sweet, creature who had seen his face and not cursed him or run from him.

He wanted to. But as Amelie's body pushed further into his in a way unfamiliar and exhilarating, Erik knew he could stand it no longer. He tore away from her, gloved hand brushing his lips as if he could grasp her kiss and hold it with him forever. He pulled the lapel of his jacket to straighten the shoulders, smoothed back wig of jet black hair atop his head, and turned back towards Amelie with the intention of returning the mask she still held in her hand to its rightful place. Erik extended a his long, angular arm towards her and said gruffly,

"Come. We must be going now. That fool will undoubtedly be coming towards our theater

soon. We must not be here when he does."

"Not with the mask," Amelie set her jaw with the familiar stubbornness Erik had come to adore, but this time he could not give in. It was not a matter of romance or affection, but a practicality that could not be avoided

"We would draw too much attention. A mask is better than this face when walking the streets of men."

Amelie hesitated before resigning to the honest truth of his assessment and extending the mask back to him.

"Come, we have one last stop. You will need travelling clothes and in our hasty departure from Soucia we brought none of your belongings. The costumes for the Opera will surely provide something suitable," said Erik as he replaced the mask and turned to grab a cloak.

"Of course, Erik," Amelie said with humorous resignation. Intending to leave immediately after retrieving what few changes of clothes Amelie would need for the coming days, Erik retrieved Feste and a small luggage bag of his own, donned his hat once more, and prepared to leave the Opera Ghost behind forevermore.

* * *

Amelie blushed when she thought of the great abandon with which she had kissed Erik. How improper! She could imagine her mother scolding her with a secret pride for her great dismissal of norms and the audacious way in which she seized control at last. The freedom was exhilarating and more than that the kiss… it awakened something inside of her that had thus far lain dormant; something fiery and burning, something fearless and strong. All the things she so desperately yearned to feel after Theo had so viciously attacked and broken her.

But Amelie was not broken at all. No, she was leaving Paris, as she had always intended, and she was going with the man she loved.

The man she loved. What a strange thing to think upon, indeed. All the reservations and qualms she (apparently rightly) felt towards Theo were absent with Erik; when she kissed him, it set her heart aflame; when they worked on their opera she felt stimulated and inspired; when she thought of the two of them together she felt such a multitude of things that it made her heart dance wildly in her chest and her stomach feel sickly excited-amorous, invigorated, challenged, tender. All of it at once, an unceasing ripple of emotions manifested on her features when the spoke, indicating a wild current beneath the still waters of her strong demeanor, a current that she hoped Erik could sense.

Though, she knew she needed to remain strong; for Erik still feared her in some strange way. When she suddenly kissed him, he struggled to kiss her back with the same lovely abandon. Then, he felt the need to so suddenly compose himself. Why? A knot in her stomach reminded her of Christine and Amelie's thoughts danced wildly upon the consideration that perhaps Erik thought more of his enshrined prima donna than he did of her. But her more rational sense felt that he only displayed the tragic characteristics of one who had existed unloved and unwanted for half a century.

As they made their way through the back of the Opera House sets, there was no time to think of that. Erik led the way in darkness and silence, familiar with every step and uneven floorboard, every creak and sigh from the building's stone and the wooden rafters, every sudden turn. He would extend a hand to Amelie when he changed directions quickly and raise a protective arm over her when she passed under a sudden step that was too high to avoid the declining ceiling above. It was a form of his affection, she knew, in and of itself; an attempt to convey that he _cared_ , truly and genuinely, enough not to stride forward aggressively on his longer limbs and with his larger strides.

Then, when Amelie rounded a corner too quickly, she caught on a board that hit around her stomach, forcing her to spin around with a small cry. Only, when she spun, she realized it had not been a board at all, but a limb belonging to someone she had hoped never to encounter.

"I can navigate the darkness alright as well, my darling," Theo threatened, standing over her and holding her close.

Before she could even utter his name, Erik had turned and lunged towards Theo, stopping only when the slightest glint of a revolver pressed against Amelie's neck.

"I'll snap your neck, you horrid boy," Erik hissed though his body remain still as death, careful not trigger any reaction from Amelie's attacker.

She tried desperately to think of escape, but the breath stuck in her throat; she could not speak, could not think, only fall prey to the paralyzing adrenaline pumping hot through her veins and silencing her mind. Amelie could only look towards Erik's gold eyes, frantic and calculating all at once, and hope for reprieve. How silly and desperate to need saving again, but what other option did she have when her own limbs betrayed and abandoned her?

"Should you even try, the gun would fire and we would both be lost. No matter what you do, Amelie and I will forever belong together," Amelie could almost hear the nauseating, taunting smile spread across Theo's face.

"What in your life made you grow so evil?" She grimaced, not meaning to speak the words aloud. Again, betrayed by her own fickle body.

"You! You have somehow managed to bring out all the love in my soul and it will stop at nothing to ensure that the world is righted. You're confused; you don't belong with this murderous beast, my love. You belong with me, as our parents and your dear, late uncle always intended," Theo ranted, still holding the gun towards her. "I never even owned a revolver, did you know that? Purchased this just today with the intention of saving you, and now look: I have!"

"Saved from what?" Erik growled. Amelie could see his rage begin to boil and knew there would be no containing it.

"From you, of course, you wretch!" Theo snapped, his tone exasperated and bewildered. "Now, enough of this. Listen; Amelie will come with me of her own accord or, so help me, I'll shoot the beast to save her from her own confusion. If you, monster, attempt to interfere, I shall be forced to kill her and myself. Choose now, my darling: Will you spend your days with me or send the monster to its grave?"

A roar emanated from Erik, a deafening, terrifying sound that unnerved Amelie to the core.

"Please, Erik…" She whimpered as tears formed in her eyes. "Please, understand…"

"I'll not have it!" Erik shouted, his voice somewhere between a scream, a cry, and a threat. "Not again, not like this!"

"We've passed that point, creature!" Theo exclaimed with more than a touch of glee. Amelie had already resigned herself, and he knew it. He had at last won her over, the way a victorious general claims a prize slave after a great battle.

"Erik… you know I have only one option…" Amelie felt the first of her endless tears stream down her cheek.

"Yes! Choose your own freedom; kill me and let it be done. Let the _real_ monster leave you be the rest of your days and spare me this torment!" He cried, his long arms gesticulating all his wild terror.

"No… never…"

"How preciously sentimental! But the sentiment is misplaced, my darling! You will see…" Theo mocked and cooed.

"I choose you, Theo," Amelie set her painful jaw together in one last grimace and wince. She hoped Erik would understand; after all they had shared she could not condemn him to death. She could not condemn Theo before, and she certainly could not sacrifice Erik now. Besides, an insane man cannot be trusted to honor his promises. "Now let us go. Leave Erik and let us go and be married."

Amelie saw Erik's eyes harden, steely and horrible but sad and lost all at once, and his mouth drop so slightly. She knew the insult would strike him deeply; not only would she choose this other man, but she would marry him. She would become his in every sense.

Amelie only hoped Erik would understand.

"Then, for our own protection and simply for good measure, my darling," Theo replied solemnly before the harsh _bang_ of the gun near her face silenced her senses, filling them instead with a deafening ring and the feeling of blood draining from her face and limbs. The gun made contact with the side of her head long enough to shock her, but not strongly enough to withhold her screams, until it hit once more and led her to the most paralyzing darkness of all.


	20. The Dream and the Reality

**A/N: Hi! First, my apologies for the horrible cliffhanger. It was my intention to use that breaking point but also to follow it immediately with a next chapter to keep the momentum going. Life, however, had other plans and a busy week kept me away from writing.**

 **Second, I think we have only two chapters left before the end. So there's that. Please review! Though the end is near, I haven't quite figured out how it's going to end. I have two planned out in my head so any feedback you have would be interesting in helping me decide which fits better.**

 **Thanks!**

* * *

"My love, it is only a nightmare! Awake! Awake!" Delicate, precious hands shook Erik's arm. Though soft they were, the grip was a vice, dragging him from a world of horrid darkness; fear, helplessness, a _gunshot_.

Through a gasp Erik awoke, his angular chest and back and down to his hips and legs covered in a cold, stinking sweat. Though he expected horror, he woke to find none there. Instead, he found Amelie's face adjacent to his staring at him with fondness and worry, all encapsulated in her full, hazel eyes. Her long, unkempt wavy hair kissed against his ears and cheek as Erik realized she lay next to him with hair unpinned and-

"I'm so terribly sorry, my darling, I don't know how… I… you're not presentable in this fashion, I truly could not explain what possessed me to-" Erik stammered recoiling from her nearly-bare body and standing to find himself still fully dressed. Amelie wore nothing but a nightgown, loose on her frame but hugging just enough; her neck, her collarbone, and two curves of her-

 _None of this follows reason_.

"No, my love, do you not recall?" Amelie's brow creased, a mixture of confusion but what seemed irritation as well. "We only had one night here in Soucia before we would depart from Marseilles. At first I took the bed, but I couldn't bear to see you lying on the floor and so finally I convinced you to sleep here, but the nightmares, oh the nightmares! I only wish I could have woken you sooner. "

"Marseilles?"

 _No. Calais_.

"You worried Calais would be too obvious; Theo would expect us to depart from a Northern port and going to Amsterdam seemed reasonable after he had seen our letters. Do you truly not recall?"

"Yes, sorry… no, I-"

"We came to my uncle's because you had injured yourself, slipping on the stone by the underground lake… we needed somewhere to stay, just a night while you recovered…"

 _I would never misstep… how foolish… but yes, this seems right_.

Erik rubbed his temples, sure enough finding a large, red lump on his right side. He could remember, vaguely, carrying a basket, finding Amelie… the drawings… she had kissed him!

"The kiss…"

"That was real, my love," Amelie rolled onto her back, still in bed and stretched out with no care for convention. A small, high-pitched moan escaped from her, and Erik felt himself utterly undone.

"And modesty be damned! Of course... we never…" A scarlet flush filled her face, accenting the sharp bones of her cheeks. "Well, suffice it to say, you stayed dressed exactly as you are now. But the nightmares, they were awful, Erik, simply awful. You've cried real tears in your sleep. What did you dream of?"

"I dreamt…" Erik began. A flash vision entered his mind. Theo, Amelie, a gun. "No… no, let's not discuss it."

"Then, come lay down with me again, my love. Let us stay here only a little while longer." Amelie patted the bed next to her and Erik recognized the blue blanket, still folded neatly but askew at the foot of the bed, from the room Amelie had once occupied. His eyes darted to the corner in which he had first seen her after those long weeks, bound, dirty, wounded, in tears. "Don't think on it any longer…it was the only room. The other belonged to Henri and, well… we couldn't."

 _It follows. This seems alright._

Erik moved to sit once more on the bed next to Amelie, but maintained that his back stay turned towards her allowing him to face away from her hardly-clothed figure.

"We can't stay like this… it's indecent."

"For a man to see his companion?" He could nearly _hear_ the grin spread across her face. "Can you imagine? The streets of India, studying the Buddhist temples, the two of us together on the streets of Italy, Austria… America! Let's go to America, too!"

The soft, nimble hands wrapped around Erik's chest and he could feel the warmth of her body pressed against his back. He closed his eyes, allowing himself for only a moment to absorb the sensations and to feel himself melt into her, his cold limbs indistinguishable from the heat of the caressing, soft figure embracing him. Gentle, supple lips found their way to his shoulder and a subtle moan escaped Erik's thin-skinned lips. He wanted to fight each sensation; the sweetness of her touch, the heat of her breath against the cold, bare skin of his neck, the way her delicate hands traced sweet lines up across his chest and his ribs.

 _How can she even bear to…_

Then, with the gentlest touch, he felt his face swivel and turn at Amelie's beckoning, only now aware that he did not wear his mask. Erik wanted to fight here; to turn and run, hide his face and reclaim his mask and scold her for daring to look upon something so wicked. Of course, she had once but this was different. They were both so naked.

Yet instead of recoiling from his own unmasking, Erik fell into her lips, devouring the taste of her with every fervent caress. It was an unfamiliar motion for them both; teeth would scrape and clatter every so often and in a desperate attempt to halt this most unpleasant sensation, a horrible insult to the utterly wonderful touches they shared, Erik turned his limbs towards Amelie on the bed. She responded eagerly, reaching ever deeper with her mouth. Erik could feel the stubbornness in her kiss, the strength and the stoicism so obviously only a mask for the desperate yearning that lay within her.

 _My love… she's never called you that before._

"My love…" Erik pulled away for the briefest moment, but Amelie continued, tracing the line down the sinews of his neck towards his collarbone, jutting out from beneath his skin like the ridge of a canyon. "You've never called me that… my love."

"But I do love you, Erik, and I would choose you again and again and again," Amelie whispered in his ear, placing a small kiss and a gentle nip upon the highest point of it. "I would choose you above all else in this world…"

 _Above all else…_

 _"Monsieur…."_ A voice called to him, but it was not Amelie's and Erik felt his entire body yearn for its silence.

 _Cease this incessant racket!_

 _"Monsieur, it is only a dream…"_

"Aaaaargh!" Erik awoke to a splitting, blinding, burning pain on the left side of his body, his hand rushing to fight the horrid searing sensation away. When this failed to stop the pain, Erik withdrew it, holding it up to his face to find only the small, faint stains of blood upon his own hand.

"Monsieur, forgive me, I've tried to stop the bleeding but-"

"Madame Giry you _fool_!" Erik spat.

"Please, monsieur, you were injured and I heard the shot… quite by chance you see, I had only stopped because we needed some materials from the costumes…"

"I care not about your petty thievery, Madame. Where is Amelie, where is the girl?" Erik hissed, still wincing as he rocked himself upwards, gasping and grasping at the gouge in his side as he did so.

"The gentleman… They went together… he carried her, she must have fainted!"

 _No, not fainted_.

"Not fainted…" Erik grimaced.

"Then, monsieur, it must mean… was this not a duel?"

"A duel, Madame," growled Erik. "Is a fair fight. This was no duel. She need choose my life or her freedom."

"Monsieur… it's…"

"Oh blast, do not think me a fool, woman. I do not fail to see the irony in my predicament. Perhaps this is the world's way of scolding me for my poor treatment of Christine one last time. Perhaps the world is mocking me."

"Monsieur, the governess chose him."

"It was not a choice, it was an ultimatum, and there is no choice in such a matter," Erik retorted coolly. "She chose nothing… just as Christine chose nothing. It is all such a silly, horrid dance to a song set in motion by men who know only of possession and not of love."

"Monsieur… the songbird…" Madame Giry gestured to the cage, it's walls bent and distorted. "It's passed."

"Curse you!" Erik now shouted, his voice faltering only at the pain of his wound caused by the force of his own words. "Can you not see? The bird means _nothing_ without her. _She_ is the muse. _She_ is the music, the words, the setting, the acts. Without her there is no opera, there is _nothing_."

Erik pulled himself up from the divan in the underground house, impressed that Madame Giry had managed to drag him to the depths and across the lake. He was acutely aware of the severity of his injury and the subsequent distress and desperation Giry must have experienced that would have allowed her to accomplish such a feat. The wound throbbed in his side, a horrible reminder of the reality of Amelie's cries ringing through his mind. If only the dream had been real, and reality had been but a horrid dream!

Instead, as Erik struggled to stand tall, he wanted nothing more than to collapse under the weight of what his cruel memory forced him to recall; the fear in Amelie's eyes, the twisted humor and audacity on that cursed boy's face, the moment in which he watched his dearest's soul break in the face of an ultimatum so ghastly, and finally, the scream ripped from her throat as the gun went off.

A monster he may be, at least the Phantom intended to keep his promise to let Vicomte live if Christine had chosen to stay. Theo on the other hand broke his very first promise to his bride.

 _His bride_. The thought of it was nearly enough to make Erik wretch (or maybe that was the pain from the gunshot). He could not stand to allow such a horrible fate befall the one creature that had truly loved him. Feste, the poor songbird, had passed away, but such a fate would not be Amelie's; she would never be lost to him.

"Madame Giry, I must ask one last favor of you," Erik managed to say through heavy, pained breaths.

"Of course, Monsieur," She replied with the ever-present fear in her eyes mixed now with pity and remorse.

"You must find where this boy lives… Theo, Theo Moreau, I believe Amelie mentioned. It is here in Paris. Find him then return to me. I shall tend to these wounds while you are away."

"Monsieur…" Madame Giry's eyes widened with shocked realization.

"What may or may not occur after that point in time is of no concern to you, Madame." Erik paused before adding for good measure, "Isn't it evident that I am trying to do the right thing? I would give Amelie the luxury of choice that I never gave Christine."

Madame Giry nodded to herself and as Erik watched her make her way surely from the house to the lake as if familiar with every nook and step, he knew that his time under the Opera House was almost spent.

* * *

 _Erik is dead_.

 _Erik is dead._

 _Erik is dead._

The more the words whispered through her mind, the harder Amelie found it to believe. But as she came to consciousness, the words were relentless and unending, determined to burn themselves in until they became a reality.

If the words were true, this was not a reality Amelie wanted to wake to, and so she found herself squeezing her eyes shut in a refusal to acknowledge that anything had happened at all. If she could keep her eyes closed, then she could still imagine herself laying comfortably on the divan by the fire with Erik just across the room from her. She could imagine that the horrible ringing that lingered in her mind was not the result of a gunshot that had more than likely….

 _Erik is dead_.

Tears formed in the creases between her still-shut eyelids. Amelie knew she had heard the gunfire, knew she had felt the recoil barely miss her own head, and recalled the heat emanating from it as it struck her into oblivion. Had Theo's shot missed its target, Amelie also knew with absolute certainty that she would not be wherever she was. Perhaps she would be on a train, or in a carriage, off to Calais and to a world of possibility that now seemed a lifetime away.

 _I should have just gone to Prussia_.

As Amelie lay on a soft bed, still refusing to move, she wished she had never gone to the underground house by the lake. Of course, she would have never known Erik and the thought of never hearing his wonderful voice, his intoxicating music, or breaking down the walls of his ever-present guard, and that consideration was heartbreaking in its own way; but Erik would be alive, at least.

Finally, Amelie mustered the strength to open her eyes. The room she lay in was adorned with an intricate, pearl inlay wardrobe, its dark wood set against the backdrop of deep, green walls and dark floor boards. A beautiful mahogany vanity covered neatly with tins of rouge, pencils, and brushes awaited her with a lovely navy gown draped over the chair. Amelie looked down to realize she was still wearing the same messy frock she had worn when she last left Theo's company. Clearly, the intention was that she change and make herself presentable.

Grateful though she was for the new dress and the chance to wash even most modestly, Amelie refused the rouge and paints. Instead, she stared into the mirror, brushing her hands against the bruise on her jaw and thinking with great pride on how she would not hide it. Her intense disapproval and hatred would show in her bruises, her red marks, the way she set her jaw and squinted her eyes and curled her mouth in a contemptful grimace.

A knock came at the door.

"My darling, you've awakened? I hear your steps," The voice was tentative, eager, and tender, yet still, without her consent or acknowledgement, the door opened uninvited. For a moment, the two stared in silence. "Oh please don't look at me like that, love, I can't stand the venom in your eyes."

"Yet how could you expect anything less than viciousness from me now," Amelie stated flatly. "You didn't keep your word."

"Oh, but I did! You see the monster _was_ alive when we left him, I only needed a way to get us away from him. We wouldn't have had a moment to escape without him snapping our necks had we simply left him there," Theo explained. His tone was matter-of-fact, even condescending, as if Amelie were a small child who simply couldn't understand the obvious.

"It would not have been such a loss," Amelie muttered, scalding tears beginning to well in her eyes. "For this is no life for me, Theo. Don't you understand: I am fundamentally flawed if I am not free."

"Oh my little bird, but you are free! Once we are married you shall have all the freedoms in the world!"

"A forced marriage isn't freedom, Theo. Perhaps I severely misled you, perhaps my uncle spoke too freely in giving away my hand, but it does not justify this behavior," Amelie pushed back the tears and spoke with as much confidence as possible. "Don't you see? I have nothing to live for if you hold me like this. I am only a prisoner."

"So melodramatic!" Theo exclaimed humorously as he approached her. He reached out to grasp her hand, but Amelie recoiled. "Do not run from me. This is how it is to be."

"No! It must be how I choose, and I do not choose this!"

"My dear, I've been angelically patient with you, but enough of this," warned Theo. "You will have three days to prepare. Write to your family in Prussia, if you choose, invite any friends you may have… though after living in a dungeon I'm sure there can't be many… it must be odd finding oneself so utterly alone… but I digress! We shall marry on the fourth day of this week. I'll make the arrangements for a simple ceremony."

"And if I refuse?"

"Why refuse now? The monster is dead. No one is coming for you. You are alone, unemployed, destitute… it seems fate has found it appropriate that I be here in your time of need."

Amelie felt the tears threatening at her composure again as she realized how horribly correct he was. With no references, no job, no family to speak of, and without Erik… poor, poor Erik!... what options did she have? Did any of it matter anyway? Should she choose to make her escape, what sort of life awaited her? Silence.

"Very well! I see you require some time to regain your composure, but then you must come join me for dinner," Theo clapped his hands together once in celebration of Amelie's quiet resignation before turning abruptly, without any acknowledgement from Amelie, and leaving her alone.

Finally, the tears came. Amelie couldn't comprehend it all, but at the heart of her overwhelming grief lay one realization: None of it mattered without Erik. Without the music and wonder and tempestuous nature of their affection, the world was cripplingly silent.


	21. The Cognac

**Everyone:** My SINCEREST apologies for the extended absence. Sometimes you get smacked across the face by life all at once and everything just gets overwhelming. As you may have guessed, that's the kind of situation in which I've found myself. On top of that, I really struggled with writing this chapter… and, as with many chapters before, I find myself not completely satisfied with it. Regardless, you all deserve an ending and so I'm posting this chapter and the Epilogue is written and under final review.

Again, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Thank you so much for your patience and understanding.

* * *

"Erik please… give me strength… give me courage," Amelie whispered into the darkness. She had made a habit over the past few days of speaking to him. She knew he would not speak back to her from the shadows, but it brought her the smallest solace in the depths of loneliness. Yet tonight was different.

"I am just a moth trapped in a spider's web, destined to be consumed until nothing remains of me…" Amelie whispered through her tears. "All I can hope for is to become a hollow version of myself, something that serves no purpose but to feed the spider."

Hopelessness seeped into her soul and finally the moth did not struggle against the spider's web anymore. She would resign herself to her fate.

Prior to that night, Amelie had only consumed alcohol in small doses, only to the point that it warmed her body in the slightest fashion. But as she crept down the stairs, well after Theo had retired for the evening, she did so with a different intention. The cognac Theo kept tucked on a shelf above the counter top would make her sleep and would quiet and numb her fears. She had seen it with her Uncle, the way his eyes would glaze over as his worries and insecurities were hushed by drink. Even in his last days, the enveloping, tender haze of wine had alleviated his agony to some degree and, though his pain was not replaced by genuine joy, Henri's suffering lessened. Amelie wanted the same for herself.

And so she consumed her first small glass, the burning warmth causing her to gag and choke. The second she drank with the same discomfort, but by her third it was as if she had consumed the fiery drink all her life. She could barely taste it, only felt the heat of it as it met the sides of her tongue and the back of her throat. Soon enough, she felt her mind quiet, replaced by dizziness. Bottle in hand, Amelie crept as silently as possible up the stairs once more.

As the facade of peace brought by drunkenness filled her soul, Amelie finally felt a burst of creativity run through her like a fierce gust of wind. In sloppier than usual letters, she scrawled quill and ink against parchment, channeling the final words of Eleonora from mind to paper.

She ran a hot bath and as soon as her skin met the water Amelie melted into it, utterly consumed by drunkenness and warmth. Steam from the heat of the water stifled her breathing, but there felt an odd sense of relief at the sensation.

A fourth drink and a fifth. Amelie drank each one with more eagerness and desperation; she needed this feeling to continue, to grow, to silence the smallest whispers of sadness that still haunted her. After the seventh drink Amelie could not remember just how much she had consumed but she felt drowsiness overcome her. The now-empty bottle slipped from her hands with a hollow song as it met the wooden floorboards.

Absent of fear and free from the trap that had ensnared her, she disappeared below the water into sleep.

* * *

Finally, Erik arrived at his destination. He cursed himself for the hundredth time since the horrid affair began, this time for not taking a carriage to the home before him. He had feared recognition, that someone would detain him and further delay him from his destination, and so he had chosen to stride silently through the night. Despite his tardiness, however, he felt his first twinge of hope as he saw light coming from a single window. It reminded him of Soucia, except this time there were no voices. Perhaps they slept. Perhaps, on this night, he would not have to kill and he and Amelie could disappear into the night in silence.

But as Erik sets his jaw he knew he did not want such a peaceful ending to prevail. He wanted to kill.

He moved silently towards the door and found it locked, but it did not take much prying to quietly break the lock and force his way in. The breath caught in his lungs for a moment when Erik entered the living room to find his adversary propped against the fireplace by one, tired arm, staring vapidly into the embers of a fire that had long died. Yet when he saw Theo, and despite the insatiable viciousness in his veins, Erik could not help but spare a moment of pity for him. As the boy turned to face the intruder, Theo's eyes were red and swollen from tears and dark shadows framed below them indicating a grief and despair Erik found only too familiar. Theo stood staring into the smoldering fireplace blankly, until his eyes met Erik's. The cold gleam of a knife shone through the darkness, gripped tightly between his hands.

"Ghost or imposter?" Theo croaked. "It matters not now; she will never love me…"

"Good of you to come to terms with it, monsieur," Erik hissed with all the cold venom he could muster.

With only a few long strides across the room, Erik was behind him, lasso around his neck. There was a cry as Theo struggled only for a moment, driving the blade into the inside of Erik's thigh until Erik twisted the lasso and heard the snap of bone. The hand holding the knife went limp, but the blade remained.

Erik looked towards the stairs, hoping to see Amelie and expecting to find horror upon her features. Yet no figure appeared from the darkness.

After dropping the recently deceased to the floor, adrenaline and satisfaction hot in his veins from the kill, Erik stared at the knife buried into his skin, realizing the wound had come dangerously close to the artery. He tried to carry himself forward with the blade still in place but his muscle screamed in agony at the continued presence of the object. With one swift motion, he drew it from his body, ignoring the subsequent pulse of blood and instead choosing to drag himself up the stairs.

Erik, silent as ever despite a pronounced limp, pushed the door open to the room that held the single light in the home only to find it empty. But the door to the adjacent washroom was cracked open, light seeping through the space between the door and wooden floors below it.

"Amelie, dearest?" Erik grimaced through the pain of his wounds but his words were met only with painful quiet. Tentatively, he pushed the door open, his eyes immediately falling upon her bare knees protruding over the rim of a gold-footed tub. Quickly he shut the door once again, embarrassed at the immodesty of it all. "I apologize, my dear, when you did not answer I felt the need to investigate, I did not realize you were so… exposed. Hurry now, we must take our leave from Paris."

When his apology was met once again with silence, his heart pounded horribly in his chest. He could not feel the pain in his leg anymore, for it was overpowered by cold dread creeping into his body. Slowly, he pushed the door open once again.

It was then that Erik realized her head was not visible above the water. He moved towards the tub swiftly, as if without injury, to pull her above the placid surface. He found Amelie had grown pale, much paler than he had seen before and the air was ripped from his lungs. Limping quietly to the bed with heavy, breath torn from his lungs with agony, he ripped the sheets off with a grimace and returning to Amelie. With all the strength left in him, he pulled her from the chilled water, wrapping her in the soft, white sheets.

Feeling hot tears well into his eyes, Erik hardly noticed his own blood soaking the sheets that held Amelie's body. Gathering himself as best he could, he raised a nervous, shaking hand towards her neck seeking any sign of life within her. Nothing. As his breathing grew labored and shallow, Erik wanted to plead with her to return to him, but his mind instead drowned in the physical agony of distress and, if he could bring himself to recognize it, loss.

A horrible roar, the cry of despair, tore itself from his throat as he held Amelie close, burying his face for the last time into her frizzy, russet hair. He kissed her head over and over, tasting his own tears as they ran in rivers below the mask.

For how long he sat, tangled in her body and the bloodied sheets he did not know. It wasn't until he noticed a scrawled letter hanging from her writing desk that he found the strength to move. Gently, he rested Amelie against the wall, gently stroking her cheek as if she only slept. Erik could not walk; his legs shook and his hands trembled, his limbs weak and unyielding to his own mind, but he moved towards the parchment as best he could.

Finally his struggle towards the desk allowed him to grasp the papers strewn across the desk. Propping himself against the drawers, he read Amelie's last words. Immediately he recognized them as her last contribution to their opera. Erik's body shook with tears, his hand raised to his mouth to stifle sobs, as he drowned in her sadness and utter abandon as she wrote the final lament of Eleonora.

 _Let it all pass to the River of Silence._

 _Let it pass to the River of Silence._

Through the vision blurred with tears, Erik reached up to the desk, grasping at the quill and ink on the desk. Melancholy cello sang through his mind and he scribbled the few notes of the main line above her words.

Then, as darkness crept into his vision, Erik crawled across the floor, stains of blood trailing behind him, to hold Amelie once more. Cold ran through his veins and he trembled violently as the last light of his life escaped him.


	22. Epilogue

Erik is dead.

Erik is dead and yet still Madame Giry did not feel free. Instead, she felt nothing but crippling grief, guilt, and sorrow at the events which had come to befall the Governess and the Ghost. Surely she had expected hardship for them both, but never could she have imagined that an unlikely friendship would blossom and wilt so quickly. She had not planned on interference. No, that was being overly generous; she had not planned for anything at all, save relieving herself of a self-imposed obligation. As she stood under the smog and smothering clouds of the darkest spring day she had ever known, Madame Giry could only stare at the mounds of dirt, two adjacent and only inches apart, that would forever enshrine her greatest misdeed.

No one attended the funeral of a woman who had taken her own life or of a deranged criminal. They were buried in silence and alone, save the company of Madame Giry, who remained too absorbed in her own turmoil to pay any proper respects to the pair.

The murder of a lawyer, completed with the death of two lovers, one drowned and one slain in the struggle, caught the fancy of every paper in Paris. The daily did not hesitate to illuminate every horrid detail, painting a dramatic vignette of a twisted neck, a cognac bottle fallen from the hands of a woman in the bath, two lovers drenched in blood, limbs entwined as Erik held Amelie clutched to his chest in their final moments. With the story having enthralled and captured the morbid hearts and minds of Paris, Madame Giry knew the only way the world would ever cease to sensationalize the loss, and instead lament the death of the Amelie and Erik, would be if they heard their opera. So she set out to pay homage to the last vestige of their love.

 _Eleonora_ was performed at the Opera House only a few months later, advertised as the last work of the Opera Ghost and his muse, and subsequently met with acclaim and adoration.

Box Five remained empty.


End file.
